A superb first full season in the National Hockey League has landed a Calgary Flames player in the spotlight. On Monday, the NHL announced the three finalists for the Calder Memorial Trophy, awarded to the league’s top rookie. Among the finalists was Flames netminder Dustin Wolf.

The other two finalists were San Jose Sharks forwards Macklin Celebrini and Montreal Canadiens defenceman Lane Hutson.

A Western Hockey League product originally from California, Wolf was selected by the Flames in the fourth-from-last spot, 214th overall, in the 2019 NHL Draft. At the time, Wolf was considered undersized for a goaltender and there was some doubts over whether he could translate his WHL-leading performance to higher levels of hockey.

Well, that concern looks downright silly in retrospect, doesn’t it?

Since being selected by the Flames in 2019, Wolf has been named the WHL’s top goaltender twice, the CHL’s top goaltender once, the top junior-aged goaltender in the United States once, the AHL’s top goaltender twice and the AHL’s most valuable player once. And he progressed enough that the Flames felt compelled to trade away Jacob Markstrom – a goaltender that had recently been in Vezina Trophy contention – in part to give Wolf a legit shot at full-time NHL duty.

Well, that move looks downright smart in retrospect, doesn’t it?

In his first full NHL season, Wolf made 53 starts, posted a record of 29-16-8, a 2.64 goals against average, a .910 save percentage and had three shutouts. He also had three assists. He not only led NHL rookie goaltenders in most statistical categories, he was pretty competitive league-wide when compared to all goaltenders. He’s still considered undersized for the position, listed at 6’0″ and 166 pounds, but that hasn’t seemed to get in his way thus far.

Wolf is the 10th rookie in Flames franchise history to be a finalist for the Calder Trophy. He follows Tom Lysiak (1973-74), Eric Vail (1974-75, won), Willi Pletti (1976-77, won), Gary Suter (1985-86, won), Joe Nieuwendyk (1987-88, won), Sergei Makarov (1989-90, won), Jarome Iginla (1996-97), Dion Phaneuf (2005-06) and Johnny Gaudreau (2014-15).