Way-Too-Early Way-Too-Early 2026 Norris Trophy Rankings for NHL Best Defenseman

When it comes to the NHL's individual awards, there might not be a more polarizing award than the Norris Trophy, which is handed out every year to the league's best all-around defenseman.

The controversy tends to center on how the position should be evaluated, how much offense and point production should factor into the voting, and whether it is even possible to assign an accurate, tangible value to defensive contributions.

Sometimes the best defense is a good offense.

Sometimes dominant defensive play comes from keeping the puck away from the other team.

Good defense is not necessarily about blocking shots or delivering crushing hits, because you can't do either of those things when you have the puck. And having the puck is the more desirable outcome and strategy in hockey.

This is a great time for elite defensemen in the NHL, and the past few years have seen the same names at the top of the Norris voting results. That will likely be the case again this season.

This is not a ranking of who we think are the best defensemen in the NHL right now, but rather a look at how we think the voting will play out at the end of the 2026-27 season (there can be, and probably is, a difference between those two distinctions).

So let's take a way-too-early look at the players who should figure to be near the top this season.

Just Outside the Top-Five

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Moritz Seider, Detroit Red Wings. Seider should have received more Norris Trophy attention in 2025-26, and had the Red Wings made the playoffs, there would have been an argument that he deserved more MVP consideration. Heck, he probably should have, even without the playoffs. He is as solid a two-way defenseman as there is in the NHL right now.

Lane Hutson, Montreal Canadiens. He is going to score enough to be a factor in this, and he is going to do it while playing for a Stanley Cup contender in the Eastern Conference. But will the voters like his defensive game enough to put him in the top five?

Evan Bouchard, Edmonton Oilers. The same thing said about Hutson also applies to Bouchard. And in Bouchard's case, it's the same argument, if it were on steroids. Bouchard is as dynamic as any defenseman in the NHL when he has the puck on his stick, and few players can move the puck like him. Despite that, and despite the numbers (both in terms of point production and how much better the Oilers are with him on the ice versus without him), he remains a highly polarizing player who faces some intense, and at times baffling, criticism.

Matthew Schaefer, New York Islanders. His rookie season is one of the best ever for an 18-year-old defenseman, and there is good reason to believe he can (and ultimately will) build on that in year two. But will it be enough to get him into the top-five? He might need to wait a few years, but he will get there.

Adam Fox, New York Rangers. Another objectively great player who gets weirdly criticized, but there is a good chance the Rangers bounce back this season after a strong summer. After the additions of Sean Durzi and Marcus Pettersson, the Rangers now have a very strong top-four with Fox leading the way. He has a Norris Trophy on his resume and is still that level of player.

5. Jake Sanderson, Ottawa Senators

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Sometimes the word "underrated" gets thrown around way too liberally in hockey, but Sanderson might still be firmly in that underrated category. Legitimately so. He's become one of the best all-around defensemen in the NHL and is set to be a cornerstone piece for the Senators for the foreseeable future.

Offensively, he has established himself as a 50-point player.

Defensively, his underlying metrics are superb, especially given the role he is generally asked to play.

Over the past two seasons, he has been on the ice for just 2.25 expected goals against per 60 minutes. That places him 10th out of 217 defenders who have logged at least 1,000 minutes of 5-on-5 ice time. It also comes with a 54 percent expected goals share, and he sees the majority of his shifts start with a defensive zone assignment.

He drives possession, he helps shut teams down, and he is an outstanding contributor on the offensive end of the ice.

He has already started to get some Norris Trophy love, coming off back-to-back top-10 finishes in the voting, and now that he is starting to enter his prime years, his best hockey should still be in front of him. That might also mean a big jump in the voting and perhaps a climb into the top-five. Especially if he can help get Ottawa back into the playoffs in the post-Brady Tkachuk era.

4. Quinn Hughes, Minnesota Wild

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Hughes already has one Norris Trophy on his resume, and he is going to compete for more throughout his career. The only question is what team he will be a member of if (or when) he wins another. As of now, he is a member of the Wild and should be a key piece as they make a run at contending for the Stanley Cup. And as long as he is playing there, he is going to make them an outstanding team and a wildly exciting team with forward Kirill Kaprizov.

He's an elite skater, playmaker, and point-producer at the position, and a lot of that has, in some ways, underrated his defensive game. It's a lot better than it often gets credit for being.

He is in a contract year, and there are some big questions as to what comes next for him and the Wild.

Will they go all-in on an all-or-nothing season at the Stanley Cup with him and risk losing him for nothing but salary cap space after the season? Would they trade him in the middle of a Stanley Cup-contending season, much the same way the Colorado Avalanche traded Mikko Rantanen a season ago? Is it just a matter of time before he ends up with the New Jersey Devils and joins his brothers, Jack Hughes and Luke Hughes? Those are all big questions that are going to be lurking under the surface all season.

On the surface, he's going to keep playing at a Norris Trophy-level season.

3. Rasmus Dahlin, Buffalo Sabres

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Dahlin has consistently worked his way up the Norris voting leaderboards over the past few years, going from 15th to sixth to third this past season. After some early-career inconsistencies, a seemingly endless run of new coaches and systems, and a lot of losing, he has really taken a starring role in recent years and has been one of the driving forces behind Buffalo's escape from the NHL's basement.

In that sense, he checks a lot of boxes for what will get the attention of Norris voters.

He will have enough offense to make headlines. If Buffalo makes the playoffs again, he is going to get a lot of credit for helping to continue to turn the franchise around. He is also playing in a popular hockey market that will attract a lot of attention.

2. Zach Werenski, Columbus Blue Jackets

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After finishing as a runner-up in 2024-25, Werenski came back in 2025-26 and won it for the first time in his career with an 81-point season. He's topped the 20-goal, 80-point mark in back-to-back seasons, which is the type of production that puts him among the elite of the elite when it comes to defenseman production.

Not only for the modern NHL era, but for any era.

He is one of only 12 defensemen in NHL history to reach those milestones in a season at least two different times.

Only six have done it three times.

As long as he keeps producing offense at that level, he is going to be a factor in the voting for this award no matter what else he is doing with his game, and there is little indication that is going to stop anytime soon. He is a bright spot for the Blue Jackets and is going to have to be one of the main focal points of their offense again.

When he is healthy he is one of the best players in the league. He finally had a chance to show that the past two seasons.

1. Cale Makar, Colorado Avalanche

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Yes, this is the safe pick. It is the easy pick. But sometimes safe and easy picks are that way for a reason — and the reason is that they are also accurate.

Makar has finished in the top-10 of the Norris voting in all seven of his NHL seasons.

He has been a finalist in each of the past six seasons.

He has won it twice and been a runner-up once.

As long as he plays a full season, or anything even remotely close to that, he is going to score like a top-line forward, defend like a top-pairing defenseman, and help dictate the pace of play for one of the best teams in the league. He has the numbers, he has the name, he has the reputation, and he is going to play in every situation, in every big minute for a Stanley Cup contender.

At the very least, you can count on him being a finalist.

There is a good chance he will become the 10th defenseman in NHL history to win the Norris for a third time.