ESPN: NHL Suspend The Top Three….

The NHL All-Star break is practically a sabbatical, as the league’s 32 teams all have bye weeks scheduled around this weekend’s festivities in Toronto. It means a solid block of time to spend with loved ones, recharge weary bodies and reset mentally before the second half of the season begins.

That goes for the participants in NHL All-Star Weekend as well, even though their break involves glad-handing sponsors, playing Connor McDavid’s skills competition reindeer games and trying not to suck wind during the 3-on-3 games on Saturday. It’s a bit more taxing than, say, swinging in a hammock on a Mexican beach. But it also isn’t the grind of the playoff race, either.

But the grind begins again soon, not only for those players chasing the Stanley Cup but the ones who are pursuing individual awards, statistical benchmarks, new contracts or simply a strong finish to a disappointing season — possibly with another team.

We’ve placed each player in one of the 2024 NHL All-Star tiers, taking into account how their season has been, where it might be headed and the roles they’ll play in shaping that future.

The next NHL Awards Watch will drop next week, but the early returns suggest that these players all have case for the Hart Trophy this season — although some cases are certainly more substantial than others.

MacKinnon has been on one of the most epic offensive tears of his NHL career, with 55 points in his past 27 games. There’s an 18-point difference between MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen (66) through 49 games. Again, no spoilers, but the Avalanche star is very much near the front of the pack for league MVP.

And yet through 49 games, MacKinnon didn’t lead the NHL in points or points per game. Kucherov did, with 85 points and a 1.73 points per game average. The Lightning star is 31 points clear of the team’s second-leading scorer, Brayden Point (54), and has dragged Tampa Bay through injury and adversity into a playoff seed. His points per 60 minutes average (4.7) is the same as when he won the Hart Trophy in 2018-19.

Pastrnak is also a country mile ahead of the next highest scorer on the Bruins, leading Brad Marchand by 25 points with his 72 points in 49 games.

Matthews is also having an outstanding season comparatively. His 40 goals are 17 clear of William Nylander, the Leafs’ second-leading scorer. Overall, Matthews is on a 70-goal pace, something that hasn’t been accomplished since Teemu Selanne and Alex Mogilny both hit 76 goals in 1992-93.

Then there’s McDavid, who started slow before doing Connor McDavid things for the rest of the first half: 57 points since Kris Knoblauch took over as head coach on Nov. 13, including 26 points during Edmonton’s recent winning streak.

These five players are well-positioned in the MVP race. But there is another …

We grouped Hughes here because the five core All-Star players for the stunningly good Canucks deserve their own tier. But make no mistake that the 24-year-old is very much in the MVP race as well, trying to become the first defenseman to win the award since Chris Pronger of the St. Louis Blues in 1999-2000. Pronger was 49th in scoring that season. Hughes was ninth in points through 49 games, skating 24:30 per game and seeing time in all situations.

Vancouver has been nothing short of extraordinary under coach Rick Tocchet. Consider that the Oilers won 16 straight games but only gained six points on Pacific-leading Vancouver because the Canucks went 10-2-2 during that stretch. Their .724 points percentage would be the highest in franchise history if it holds through the end of the season.

There are a lot of impressive numbers for these five players: Miller’s 67 points, Pettersson’s 64 points and Hughes’s 64 points; Boeser’s 30 goals; and Demko’s .920 save percentage. But the most important numbers are 49 and 35: The former being the total games played by the four skaters, none of whom have missed a game this season, and the latter the number of starts for Demko, tied for fourth most in the league.

If the core stays healthy, there’s no telling what the Canucks can accomplish this season. Perhaps even something that no Canadian team has accomplished since 1993.