Bennett adds to Conn Smythe's rich history following Cup win with Panthers

The Conn Smythe Trophy was presented at Amerant Bank Arena on Tuesday for the second time in a year less a week, but the first time it was happily received.

Sam Bennett was voted most valuable player of the Stanley Cup Playoffs after the Florida Panthers' 5-1 win against the Edmonton Oilers in Game 6 of the Final, the center joyfully accepting the trophy from NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman following Florida's second consecutive championship. The forward led the postseason with 15 goals in 23 games.

Oilers captain Connor McDavid won the trophy in 2024, but he was in no mood to celebrate an individual award with the Stanley Cup about to be presented to the Panthers, winners of their first championship in a seven-game Final. The trophy would sit on a table at center ice unclaimed by its winner, who was back in Edmonton's dressing room.

Montreal Canadiens goalie Patrick Roy (l.), whose three Conn Smythe Trophy wins are the most of any player, and Vegas Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessault with NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman during their respective presentations in 1993 and 2023.

The previous time the Conn Smythe was celebrated was in 2023, Vegas Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessault taking it for a skate at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas after his team's five-game win against Florida.

Six players in the trophy's 60-year history have been multiple recipients, with goalie Bernie Parent and forwards Mario Lemieux and Sidney Crosby winning in consecutive seasons.

Goalie Patrick Roy won in 1986 and 1993 with the Montreal Canadiens, then again in 2001 with the Colorado Avalanche. Two-time winners include Boston Bruins defenseman Bobby Orr (1970, 1972); Philadelphia Flyers' Parent (1974, 1975); Oilers center Wayne Gretzky (1985, 1988); Lemieux (Pittsburgh Penguins, 1991, 1992); and Crosby (Penguins, 2016, 2017).

Philadelphia Flyers goalie Bernie Parent with his two Stanley Cup miniatures, the Conn Smythe Trophy (c.) and the Vezina Trophy beside it, with three awards he won during his junior hockey in Niagara Falls. Parent won the Cup, Conn Smythe and Vezina in 1974 and 1975.

Parent swept three awards the two seasons he won the Conn Smythe, also winning the Stanley Cup and the Vezina Trophy, the latter awarded at that time to the goaltender(s) who played a minimum of 25 games for the team that allowed the fewest goals during the regular season.

"You don't win with one guy," Parent told reporters following his 2-0 shutout of the Buffalo Sabres in Game 6 of the 1975 Cup Final. "All season, I only had to face maybe 26 or 27 shots. It's a team effort. I guess they've got to give the (Conn Smythe) trophy to someone."

Parent was as modest as he'd been brilliant that postseason, posting a 1.89 goals-against average, a .924 save percentage and four shutouts in 15 appearances.

In 1974, he registered a 2.02 GAA, a .933 save percentage and two shutouts in the Flyers' historic first Stanley Cup championship.

Bernie Parent at Fort Lauderdale Beach Park in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, during the 2023 NHL All-Star Beach Festival. From left: Parent with the Vezina Trophy, Stanley Cup and Conn Smythe Trophy, which he won with the Flyers in 1974 and 1975.

It would be 16 years before another back-to-back Conn Smythe winner would emerge. Lemieux, the Penguins captain, won the 1991 playoff MVP award, leading Pittsburgh to a six-game win against the Minnesota North Stars. The next season, "Super Mario's" name was again engraved on the Conn Smythe following a four-game sweep of the Chicago Blackhawks.

Lemieux was on another plane altogether; he had 44 points (16 goals, 28 assists) in 23 playoff games in 1991, then 34 points (16 goals, 18 assists) in 15 games in 1992, five of his goals the second year game-winners. He missed five games in the 1992 playoffs, sidelined with a broken hand, then returned in all-universe form.

"I really didn't think I would win it," Lemieux said of his 1992 Conn Smythe. "I really thought it belonged to (goalie) Tommy Barrasso. He's the one who should have won it."

Penguins captain Mario Lemieux on June 1, 1992, at Chicago Stadium with the Conn Smythe Trophy, which then featured two tiers of engraved plaques beneath the likeness of Maple Leaf Gardens and large plaque on top.

Criticized by Chicago's Mike Keenan during the Final for what the coach said was the superstar's willingness to dive to draw penalties, Lemieux grinned during his postgame news conference and said, "I'm just going to go in the room now and try to dive into that Cup."

Another Penguins legend would complete the Conn Smythe back-to-back hat trick, Crosby winning in 2016 and 2017.

The Pittsburgh captain was recognized as much for his leadership and playmaking as for his scoring touch, registering 19 points (six goals, 13 assists) in 24 games in 2016, then 27 points (eight goals, 19 assists) in 24 games the following season.

That Crosby was voted winner of the 2016 Conn Smythe despite not scoring a single goal in the six-game Final against the San Jose Sharks spoke volumes about how his broader contribution was viewed.

Penguins captain Sidney Crosby with the Conn Smythe Trophy, the first of his two consecutive Stanley Cup Playoff most valuable player awards. Pittsburgh won the championship against the San Jose Sharks at SAP Center on June 12, 2016.

"Sid does things quietly," then-Penguins GM Jim Rutherford said in 2016. "He's really a great leader. Everybody judges him on his points and how many goals he gets and things like that. But he's really an all-around player. He plays in all zones on the rink. He leads his team. He leads by example, and he does things quietly. He's a quiet leader, but a really good one."

The Conn Smythe Trophy's birth is traced to April 16, 1964. It was before Game 3 of that season's Stanley Cup Final between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings, the Maple Leafs headed for their third consecutive championship, that NHL President Clarence Campbell floated the idea that a trophy be created to honor the most valuable player of the playoffs.

In their 2011 book "Hockey Hall of Fame MVP Trophies & Winners," authors Bob Duff and Kevin Shea relate how Campbell pointed to similar awards in Major League Baseball, the NFL and the Canadian Football League, suggesting that hockey should do likewise.

With the Penguins celebrating their Stanley Cup championship in an adjacent room at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, the Conn Smythe Trophy, won by Crosby, sits by itself on June 11, 2017.

Toronto Globe and Mail columnist Dick Beddoes led a media charge in support.

"Very often, the stars of the regular season are monumental busts in the playoffs," Beddoes wrote. "Secondary performers occasionally respond in resolute fashion to Stanley Cup competition."

The 47th annual meeting of the NHL's Board of Governors on June 11, 1964, saw League governors from the NHL's six teams unanimously vote in favor of a new award to recognize the MVP of the playoffs.

All were in agreement that the trophy would carry the name of Conn Smythe, an honorary governor who had founded the Maple Leafs and was a hugely influential figure in the game. Smythe's son, Stafford, the Maple Leafs governor, offered to provide the trophy to the NHL from his team.

Canadiens captain Jean Beliveau accepts the inaugural Conn Smythe Trophy from NHL President Clarence Campbell at the Montreal Forum on May 1, 1965, and the engraving of Beliveau's name on the trophy's first maple leaf plaque. Upon its introduction, there was a single tier of plaques for the engraving of the names of winners.

The inaugural winner in 1965 was Canadiens captain Jean Beliveau, whose 16 points (eight goals, eight assists) in 13 playoff games led his team to the Stanley Cup, the first of four they would win over five seasons and his sixth of 10 career championships.

The Conn Smythe is one of the most striking awards in the Hockey Hall of Fame's trophy case. A silver replica of Maple Leaf Gardens, the team's home from Nov. 12, 1931, through Feb. 13, 1999, is backdropped by a delicate silver leaf. What began as a single wood tier beneath the arena and its base grew to two and now three tiers, the names of winners engraved on stylized maple leaves.

McDavid's Conn Smythe win last season is the most recent of six times the award has been voted to a member of the Stanley Cup Final's losing team. Four of the five before him were goalies: Jean-Sebastien Giguere of the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in 2003; Ron Hextall, Philadelphia Flyers, 1987; Glenn Hall, St. Louis Blues, 1968; and Roger Crozier, Red Wings, 1966. In 1976, Flyers forward Reggie Leach was voted winner.

A portrait of Maple Leafs founder Conn Smythe, the trophy named for him voted annually to the most valuable player of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and a 1970 newspaper clipping detailing the trophy's theft from the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Like every NHL trophy, the Conn Smythe has a rich history. In early December 1970, it was stolen from the Hall of Fame's then-Canadian National Exhibition home in Toronto, along with the Stanley Cup (a replica, as it turned out) and the Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy, and held for ransom.

A series of phone calls to Toronto police promised their return only in exchange for the release of a jailed robbery suspect. Without his release, police were told, all three trophies would be dumped in Lake Ontario.

Authorities wouldn't bow to the demand and 18 days after their theft, the Cup, Conn Smythe and Masterton mysteriously appeared on the Toronto driveway of a police detective, only the Masterton having suffered minor damage.

In fact, it was the second time in less than two years the Conn Smythe had been stolen; in April 1969, it vanished from the Hall of Fame along with the Calder Trophy and original Hart Trophy, all found less than a week later in a suburban garage.

Top photo: Credit: © Bruce Bennett/Getty Images
Florida Panthers forward Sam Bennett accepts the Conn Smythe Trophy as MVP of the Stanley Cup Playoffs from NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman at Amarant Bank Arena in Sunrise, Florida.