The NHL Awards are still two months away, but the nominations are slowly beginning to roll in. And for the Dallas Stars, they have a new member on the nomination block.
The King Clancy Memorial Trophy is an annual award given to the NHL player “who best exemplifies leadership qualities on and off the ice and has made a noteworthy humanitarian contribution to his community.”
Basically, it’s awarded to an NHL player that is an outspoken and obvious leader on his team that also has a significant hand in giving back to the community around him.
This year, Jason Spezza has a chance to win that award.
On June 21, 2017, the NHL will host the annual NHL Awards show in Las Vegas. Trophies such as the Hart, Art Ross, Selke, Vezina, Calder, and King Clancy will all be awarded to their rightful recipients. Though the Art Ross (Connor McDavid, in this case) and Rocket Richard (Sidney Crosby) winners are determined at the end of the regular season, the remaining awards are decided by judging.
Dallas Stars
One of those is the King Clancy, and there is quite an extensive pool to judge. That’s because each team in the NHL nominates one of their players to receive the award.
For the Stars, it’s 33-year-old center Jason Spezza. This is his second straight year to be the Stars’ nominee and it’s pretty obvious why he is their candidate.
Not much has to be said about the leadership qualities that Spezza possesses. He’s a seasoned veteran and leads the Stars on a nightly basis. In a lineup thriving with youth, he’s a dominant voice of reason and has proudly worn the “A” for Dallas over the past year.
But his humanitarian contributions are much bigger than an “A.” Midway through the 2015-16 season, Jason Spezza announced that he had partnered with the Dallas Stars Foundation and Texas Land and Cattle to start The Jason Spezza Scholarship Fund.
Spezza personally pledging $25,000 in both 2015-16 and 2016-17 to kickstart the program, and Texas Land and Cattle pledged to donate $300 for every point that Spezza tallied in each of the two seasons. His 113 points (48-65=113) means that Texas Land and Cattle has donated $33,900 solely based off of his points over the past two years.
They also donated an extra $10,000 at the end of this season. Altogether, the fund has collected $100,000 since its founding in December 2015.
The fund “grants monetary assistance for ice time or program fees to children that cannot participate in the Dallas Stars Metro Hockey League due to adversity faced in their lives or financial restraints within their family,” according to DallasStars.com.
In addition to donating to the fund, Spezza also hosted a hockey clinic that helped teach hockey skills to the beneficiaries of the scholarship.
Past winners of the award include Henrik Sedin, Henrik Zetterberg, Andrew Ference, and Patrice Bergeron. If Spezza is named one of the three finalists and is chosen as the winner, he will be the first Dallas Stars player to receive the award.
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After two straight years as the nominee, $100,000 raised, and a lot of time, love, and effort given back to the community, it looks like he might have a good shot.