2011 NHL Awards Tonight (EA's NHL 12 Cover Athlete to be Unveiled!)

Tonight is the 2011 NHL Awards Show which will be broadcast on VERSUS at 7:00 PM (est).  The ceremony is again being held at the Pearl Concert Theater in Las Vegas at the Palms Hotel.

Dan Bylsma is our only Penguins connection to the awards.  Bylsma has been nominated for the Jack Adams Award which is given to the season's most outstanding coach.

The Jack Adams Award is an annual award presented by the National Hockey League Broadcasters' Association to the NHL coach adjudged to have contributed the most to his team's success. The winner is selected in a poll among members of the NHL Broadcasters' Association at the end of the regular season.

Bylsma is among Barry Trotz (Nashville Predators), and Alain Vigneault (Vancouver Canucks) nominated for the prestigious coaches' award.  I think he has a pretty good chance although Vigneault makes me nervous being that he led his team to the SC Final; however, I believe the awards are voted on prior to the playoffs so he may not have that advantage over Bylsma.

The Bylsma Family in Las Vegas (at Dan's photo shoot)
photo courtesy of Penguins Report

Another exciting part of tonight's awards ceremony is the unveiling of the latest cover athlete for EA's NHL 12. 

Did you know that Sid has yet to grace the cover?  It's pretty unbelievable, but very true (I'm not sure the reasoning behind it, but a guess would be that it's too obvious a choice ... IDK).  Sid is, however, among the names being mentioned as possibilities for this year's cover. He would be the first Pittsburgh player on the cover since Mario Lemieux (NHL 2002).

My guess for this year's cover athlete is Tim Thomas.  He's a pretty worthy candidate and according to The Examiner, the last time a goalie was featured was back on NHL 97 when John Vanbiesbrouck made the cover.

So be sure to tune in to the 2011 NHL Awards tonight at 7:00 PM (est) on VERSUS.

Until then, check out the list of cover athletes below!

Players featured in EA's NHL series (with European cover athlete in parentheses):
(click on each player for a link to it's Wiki page)

• NHL 97 John Vanbiesbrouck
• NHL 98 Peter Forsberg
• NHL 99 Eric Lindros
• NHL 2000 Chris Pronger (Markus Naslund - Europe)
• NHL 2001 Owen Nolan (Jere Lehtinen - Europe)
• NHL 2002 Mario Lemieux
• NHL 2003 Jarome Iginla
• NHL 2004 Dany Heatley (original cover) / Joe Sakic (replacement)
• NHL 2005 Markus Naslund (Olli Jokinen - Finland)
• NHL 06 Vincent Lecavalier (Tuomo Ruutu - Nordic countries)
• NHL 07 Alex Ovechkin (Teemu Selänne - Finland; Henrik Lundqvist - Sweden)
• NHL 08 Eric Staal (Henrik Zetterberg - Sweden; Teemu Selänne - Finland; Jaromir Jagr - Czech Republic; Mark Streit - Switzerland)
• NHL 09 Dion Phaneuf (Mark Streit - Switzerland; Daniel Alfredsson - Sweden; Alexander Ovechkin - Russia) 
• NHL 10 Patrick Kane (Mikko Koivu - Finland; Mikkel Bødker - Denmark; Mark Streit - Switzerland; Nicklas Bäckström - Sweden)
• NHL 11 Jonathan Toews (Henrik and Daniel Sedin - Sweden; Mark Streit - Switzerland)

courtesy of NHL.com and Wikipedia