Nikita Kucherov won the 2026 Hart Memorial Trophy for the second time in his career, edging Connor McDavid by just 10 voting points in one of the closest MVP races in NHL history. The Tampa Bay Lightning winger posted 130 points at a league-leading 1.71 per game, carried his team through an injury-ravaged season, and recorded one of the highest 50-game scoring runs since Mario Lemieux. He joins McDavid, Crosby, and Ovechkin as active players with multiple Hart Trophies, and becomes the first Lightning player to win the award twice.
