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Sunday, March 02, 2003

By Dejan Kovacevic, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

DENVER -- For a man who ranks among the greatest goaltenders in NHL history, Patrick Roy also can be a pretty straight shooter.

Ask him about what Mario Lemieux has accomplished this season in challenging for the league scoring title at age 37, and he will offer unabashed praise.

But ask him if Lemieux should win the Hart Trophy as the NHL's most valuable player, and his tone changes markedly.

"Do I think Mario has a shot at it? I don't know," Roy said, shaking his head. "He needs to put his team in the playoffs. If he can do that, certainly he has a chance. Actually, if he does that with the team he has now, I like his chance to win the Hart a lot."

Roy immediately made clear that he meant not a shred of disrespect for Lemieux with that assessment. Rather, he pointed out, he simply was subscribing to the official definition that is attached to the winner of the Hart, that it goes to "the player adjudged to be most valuable to his team."

Roy is not the only one who believes that line implies that no player can be that valuable to his team if it fails to be one of the 16 teams in the Stanley Cup playoffs.

The award is selected by the voting members of the Professional Hockey Writers Association, and that group has not given the Hart to a non-playoff performer since 1988, when Lemieux led the league with 70 goals and 98 assists as the Penguins missed the postseason a sixth consecutive year. Before that, it's necessary to go way back to 1959, when Andy Bathgate had 40 goals and 40 assists for the fifth-place Rangers.

Last season, the voters had a golden chance to choose a non-playoff candidate. Jarome Iginla was the NHL's leading scorer, its only 50-goal man, and he accounted for 46 percent of the Flames' offense. But the nod went to Canadiens goaltender Jose Theodore. It was the closest balloting in history -- 434 voting points each, with Theodore winning because of three more first-place selections -- but it likely would have been an Iginla landslide if Calgary had made the playoffs as Montreal did.

Lemieux's story is sure to be no different, if only because the man emerging as the favorite, Markus Naslund, is not only challenging him for the scoring title but also the captain of a suddenly legitimate Stanley Cup contender. He is the only player who is a lock to finish with 50 goals, already owning 41, and he has blossomed into a responsible performer at both ends.

Is he better than Lemieux?

Naslund would be the first to blush at such a suggestion, as he nearly did when the subject was broached at the All-Star Game a month ago. "Mario's the best player in the world," he said at the time, and most observers doubtless would agree.

Has Lemieux had a better individual showing than Naslund?

Given that he has played nine fewer games than Naslund and worked with a significantly inferior supporting cast, especially on the back end, a strong case could be made. And if he should take the Art Ross Trophy as scoring champion while working with a hodgepodge of linemates down the stretch in the wake of the Alexei Kovalev trade, his season will be that much more impressive.

But history shows the Hart is, at least in part, a team award.

Roy was the other finalist for the trophy last season, and he credited the outstanding team behind which he played for getting him to that stage.

"I think that's how it should be," Roy said. "There are other awards for being the guy with the most goals and points. The MVP is someone who does the most for his team, and that means you at least have to be in the playoffs, I think."