SHARKSPAGE

Worcester Sharks 2010-2011 Season Awards

With the Worcester Sharks regular season coming to an end without a playoff run, it’s time to start with the end of season paperwork. Up first are the “210 Awards”. For those new to the “210 Awards”, they are a mix of serious and (hopefully) slightly humorous awards named for the moniker this writer uses on many message boards. This season’s winners are:

Best Forward: Jonathan Cheechoo lead the WorSharks in points despite playing in just 55 games, and was averaging well over a point per contest until being slowed by an injury.

Best Defenseman: Sean Sullivan was the only “every day” defenseman to not be a minus for the season (Mike Moore was a plus but only played half the season for Worcester), and was tied for 4th in team scoring with 35 points.

Tough Guy Award: Often given to the best fighter on the team. for the second year in a row it goes to the best grinder in Andrew Desjardins. There is no Worcester player better along the boards, and Desjardins’ tough style and tenacious play earned him two recalls to San Jose during the season.

Best Single Game Performance: As if Carter Hutton shutting out arch rival Providence 2-0 on February 5th wouldn’t have been enough to win the award on its own, the fact the netminder stared the day in Boston as the back-up to Antti Niemi and then driving an hour west to play for Worcester makes this one a no brainer.

Seventh Player: There are very few players that work harder than Kevin Henderson, but it took head coach Roy Sommer adding him to the Crazed Rats line for many to notice. Henderson’s six goals–tripling last season’s output–and +13 rating were a pleasant surprise for WorSharks fans.

Rookie of the Year: Tommy Wingels wins this after lots of consideration for Hutton. After starting the season in San Jose Wingels went on to lead the WorSharks in game winning goals and really showed himself to be a very good two-way player. The question about Wingels isn’t if he’ll stick full time in the NHL, but when.

Most Improved: If you don’t know why Nick Petrecki is the winner here you weren’t paying attention to the Worcester Sharks last season. Comparing last season to the current one, it was like a completely different player was out on the ice. And many times, it was. He still has a long way to go to make it to the NHL, but with leaps like he made this season he certainly could make a run at it in the future.

Most Valuable Player: For the second year in a row the MVP goes to Alex Stalock. His season ending injury and where Worcester ended up after he was out proves that. Hopefully he’ll suffer no ill effects from his leg injury and can return to form next season.

The Sharkspage Player of the Year: T.J. Trevelyan, who was named Sharkspage player of the game ten times over the course of the regular season.

So now that we’ve gotten the serious awards out of the way, here’s a few that this writer thinks should be handed out…

The Two-By-Two Award: Nick Schaus, for having the most penalty minutes without major.

The Man In The Box Award: Nick Petrecki, for being in the penalty box for the most power play goals against (7) for Worcester.

The Dead-Eye Award: Mike Moore, for having the lowest shooting percentage of any player with 50 or more shots on goal. Honorable mention goes to Jay Leach, who had a lower shooting percentage but didn’t finish the season in the organization.

The Iron Man Award: Dan DaSilva, for playing on all 80 WorSharks games this season.

The Whose Jersey Is This? award: To Riley Gill, Daren Machesney, and Jeff Jakaitis, who all wore #1 for Worcester this season. Machesney and Jakaitis wore it in consecutive games while both were on the roster together. Thomas Greiss was also assigned the number early in the season, but never wore the jersey.

The Get Me Outta Here Award: Jason Pitton, who decided that Worcester really wasn’t the place for him.

The Welcome Back To Worcester Award: Jason Pitton, who on his first visit back to Worcester–this time as a forward for Bridgeport–was absolutely burried by a Sean Sullivan hip check that made ESPN’s Top 10.

The One And Done Award: Chris Blight, who had two assist and was +2 for Worcester on January 23 and then was released.

The All Or Nothing Award: Daren Machesney, who either shut out the opponent or lost the game.

The I Am The Walrus Award: Head coach Roy Sommer, for returning to the bench after being hit in the face with the puck with so much cotton shoved into his nose it looked like he had tusks.

The Bic Award: Assistant head coach David Cunniff, for his incident on the bench that allegedly involved a pen and a linesman in Albany.

The David Haas Award: For the fourth time in five seasons, there is no winner of this “prestigious” award that goes to the player with the most talent that chooses to use none of it.