1998 Scouting Report - 2 Martin St. Louis

[Bob McKenzie]

2. Martin St. Lois (RW) - Canada - University of Vermont (Canada)

Martin St. Louis is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player. An undrafted player, St. Louis played over 1,000 games and scored 1,000 points in an NHL career that began with the Calgary Flames in 1998 and ended with the New York Rangers in 2015. St. Louis is best remembered for having played with the Tampa Bay Lightning from 2000 until being traded to the Rangers in 2014. He also briefly played with HC Lausanne of the Swiss National League A. He was a member of the Tampa Bay Lightning Stanley Cup championship team in 2004. St. Louis was elected into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2018; his first year of eligibility.



St. Louis was a standout player in college for the Vermont Catamounts, earning East Coast Athletic Conference (ECAC) and National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) all-American honors for three consecutive seasons between 1995 and 1997. He was the ECAC player of the year in 1995. As a professional, St. Louis has been named to an NHL All-Star Team on five occasions and played in six All-Star Games. He was voted the recipient of the Lester B. Pearson Award and Hart Memorial Trophy as the NHL's most valuable player as chosen by the players and league respectively in 2003–04, also winning his first Art Ross Trophy as the NHL's leading scorer with 94 points. St. Louis has on three occasions won the Lady Byng Memorial Trophy as the NHL's most gentlemanly player. In 2013, at age 37, he won his second Art Ross Trophy, becoming the oldest player to ever lead the NHL in scoring. He has also led the NHL in assists in two different seasons (2003–04 and 2012–13).



Internationally, St. Louis has played for Canada on several occasions. He was a member of the team that won the 2004 World Cup of Hockey and is a two-time silver medalist at the World Championships; he was named a tournament all-star after leading the 2009 event in scoring with 15 points. A two-time Olympian, St. Louis was a member of Canada's gold medal-winning team at the 2014 Winter Games.

St. Louis was listed at five feet nine inches tall in college. He often struggled to gain recognition for his ability, while teams showed little interest in him. He was heavily recruited by National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) schools to play for their programs, however. The University of Vermont Catamounts convinced St. Louis to join their hockey program. He had 51 points in 33 games in his freshman season of 1993–94 and was named to the East Coast Athletic Conference's All-Rookie Team.



A finalist for the Hobey Baker Award for the first of two consecutive seasons, St. Louis earned interest from National Hockey League (NHL) teams in the summer of 1996. Teams offered signing bonuses of up to $150,000 hoping to convince him to leave Vermont and turn professional. Believing he could attract similar offers the following year, he chose to complete his final year of college eligibility. His offensive numbers slipped in 1996–97 as he scored 59 points in 36 games. St. Louis finished as Vermont's all-time leading scorer with 267 points, a record he continues to hold as of 2014, as well as his school mark of 176 assists. He won the J. Edward Donnelly Award as the top male senior athlete at the University of Vermont in 1997 and was named to the ECAC's all-decade team of the 1990s.] The University of Vermont inducted him into its athletics Hall of Fame in 2007, and in 2012 he was presented with the school's Alumni Achievement Award. On January 8, 2016 the University of Vermont retired his jersey number 8 at Gutterson Fieldhouse in front of a sold out crowd.

The NHL offers St. Louis anticipated never materialized as teams lost interest in him. Only the Ottawa Senators offered him a tryout prior to the 1997–98 NHL season. When they released him, St. Louis signed a two-year contract with the Cleveland Lumberjacks of the International Hockey League (IHL) that included a clause allowing him to leave the team if offered an NHL contract. He had 50 points in 56 games for Cleveland, catching the attention of the Calgary Flames, who signed him to a contract on February 18, 1998. He was assigned to their then American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, the Saint John Flames, where he scored 26 points in 25 regular season games. He then added 20 points in 20 playoff games as Saint John reached the Calder Cup finals, losing in six games to the Philadelphia Phantoms.



St. Louis earned a spot on the Calgary roster to begin the 1998–99 season and made his NHL debut on October 9, 1998, against the San Jose Sharks. He scored his first goal on October 20 against Dallas Stars' goaltender Roman Turek. He began the season playing with Calgary's top forward, Theoren Fleury, but was quickly demoted to the fourth line, and often sat out of the lineup. He appeared in only 13 games in Calgary, spending the majority of the season in Saint John where he led the AHL squad with 28 goals and 62 points. He began the 1999–2000 season with Saint John, but earned a recall to Calgary after scoring 26 points in 17 games. St. Louis completed his first full NHL season with 3 goals and 18 points in 56 games. Pleased with his progress, general manager Al Coates picked up St. Louis' contract option for the 2000–01 season. However, the organization fired Coates and his staff that summer and the new management team was not interested in retaining St. Louis. The Flames exposed him in the 2000 NHL Expansion Draft, but after he went unselected, the team bought out his contract and made him an unrestricted free agent.



AWARDS AND ACHIEVEMENTS

NHL

Played in the NHL All-Star Game 2003, 2004
2007, 2008
2009, 2011
Plus-Minus Award
(Shared with Marek Malík) 2003–04
First Team All-Star 2003–04
Art Ross Trophy
Leading point scorer 2003–04
2012–13
Lester B. Pearson Award
Most outstanding player as chosen by the players 2003–04
Hart Memorial Trophy
Most valuable player 2003–04
Stanley Cup champion 2004
Second Team All-Star 2006–07
2009–10
2010–11
2012–13
Lady Byng Memorial Trophy
Most gentlemanly player 2009–10
2010–11
2012–13
Hockey Hall of Fame 2018

COLLEGE

All-ECAC Hockey Rookie Team 1993–94
All-ECAC Hockey First Team 1994–95
1995–96
1996–97
AHCA East First-Team All-American 1994–95
1995–96
1996–97
ECAC Player of the Year 1994–95
ECAC Hockey All-Tournament Team 1996
All-NCAA All-Tournament Team 1996

INTERNATIONAL

World Cup of Hockey champion 2004
World Championship All-Star forward 2009
Men's Hockey Olympic Gold Medal 2014

PROS:



CONS:

Overcelebrates sometimes. Celebrates too hard. Also don't leave him off Team Canada or he will flat out quit your team.