The Top 7 Faceoff Winners

This group of centers are the top faceoff winners per game on average. A couple of them have actually missed some games due to injuries so their totals are not as high as they should be.

1. Rod Brind’Amour | Carolina Hurricanes
Brindy is having a rough year in the +/- department. He is -29 on the season, good for dead last in the entire NHL. Brind’Amour has been known as a solid defensive forward in the past which includes winning a couple Selke trophies. He has been the top faceoff man in the league for a while now and that likely won’t change until he retires or at least gets his minutes cut down significantly.

2. Shawn Horcoff | Edmonton Oilers
Horcoff is the Oilers’ top center and is their best faceoff man by far. Edmonton’s other pivots are rather young and not so great in the faceoff circle. Horcoff is behind Brind’Amour with over 530 faceoffs won thus far.

3. Mikko Koivu | Minnesota Wild
Mikko Koivu is having a true breakout season with 47 points in 47 game played. He is also one of the top 3 faceoff men in the league, averaging over 11 faceoffs won per game.

4. Mike Richards | Philadelphia Flyers
Richards is right behind Mikko Koivu with over 500 faceoffs won. He is the Flyers’ top player at the moment because he plays in all types of situations. He plays lots of minutes on the power play, and on the PK, and in other crucial situations in games. Due to this, he ends up taking key faceoffs often and wins enough of them to help out any fantasy team in that category among others.

5. Samuel Pahlsson | Anaheim Ducks
Pahlsson, the man who some say should have won the Conn Smythe trophy when the Ducks won the Cup a couple years ago, is a very useful defensive forward who plays in clutch situations. He may not have the offensive prowess that all the others on this list have but he is extremely valuable on the ice in actual hockey. As for fantasy hockey, he is not as valuable except of course your league uses faceoffs as a category.

6. Paul Stastny | Colorado Avalanche
Stastny has 366 faceoff wins on the season, which is actually out of the top 25 in terms of total faceoffs won, but the reason he is not near the top in terms of totals is because of all the time he has missed thus far. Young stud Stastny is currently on injured reserve but when he does return the lineup, he will retake his position as Colorado’s top guy on offense as well as in the faceoff dot. Stastny is right up with Pahlsson averaging almost 11 faceoff wins per game played.

7. Sidney Crosby | Pittsburgh Penguins
Sid the Kid has just under 500 faceoffs won which puts him 6th overall in terms of total faceoffs won. Crosby is still just behind Stastny though in terms of average faceoffs per game. If your league uses faceoffs, that makes Crosby even more valuable, which is incredible.