Top 10 Swedish players ever!

Per Calgary Sun:

No Swedish player enjoyed a longer or more prolific career than Mats Sundin, but does that make him the greatest Swede ever to lace up a pair of skates?

With the big centre’s retirement last week, now is the perfect time to look back and assess his legacy. And while he may be the highest-scoring Swede in NHL history, he is by no means the only one to leave an indelible mark on the North American game.

To see how far they’ve come in the 44 years since the fragile Ulf Sterner became the first European-trained player to skate in the NHL, one needs only to consider the accomplishments of some of his fellow countrymen:

There’s Hakan Loob, whose brief tenure with the Calgary Flames included a 50-goal season; budding superstar Henrik Zetterberg, who won the Conn Smythe Trophy in Detroit’s 2008 Stanley Cup run; gritty winger Tomas Sandstrom, who scored 857 points in 15 NHL seasons; and Flyers goalie Pelle Lindbergh, who won the 1985 Vezina Trophy before dying in a car crash that same year.

And those are the guys who didn’t make the list.

10. Anders Hedberg

Like the beaches of Normandy on D-Day, the now-demolished Winnipeg Arena was the spot where Swedish players first gained a foothold in their invasion of North American hockey. Together with countryman Ulf Nilsson, Anders Hedberg was one of the first players to storm the beach in 1974, scoring 100 points in his rookie season with the World Hockey Association’s Winnipeg Jets. He led the Jets to a pair of Avco Cups, in 1976 and 1978, before fleeing to the New York Rangers of the NHL in 1978. Although he didn’t dominate as he had with the Jets, Hedberg was still a solid player, scoring 398 points in 465 games over seven seasons.

9. Thomas Steen

If he had played on a better team, Thomas Steen would likely rank much higher on this list. Instead, he toiled for 14 years on some mostly mediocre Winnipeg Jets teams of the 1980s and early ’90s, scoring 817 points in 950 career games. Unlike many of his countrymen, Steen went about his business with a minimum of flash and was consistently one of the league’s top two-way forwards. In 1990, he was named in a poll of his peers as the NHL’s most underrated player.

8. Markus Naslund

After starting his career slowly with three lacklustre seasons in Pittsburgh, Markus Naslund was dealt to the Vancouver Canucks in 1996 for prospect Alex Stojanov. The trade soon turned out to be one of the most lopsided in NHL history, as Naslund became a prolific scorer, racking up 869 points in 1,117 games, while Stojanov scored exactly two goals in his entire career. Naslund’s best season came in 2002-03, when his peers awarded him the Lester B. Pearson Award as top player, and he was narrowly edged out by good friend Peter Forsberg for the Hart and Ross trophies.

7. Mats Naslund

Quick quiz: Who is the only Montreal Canadiens player to have a 100-point season in the last three decades? Yes, it was little Mats Naslund, who had 43 goals and 67 assists in 1985-86. Although he never wore the “C” as captain, Naslund established himself as one of the team’s leaders during his eight seasons with the Habs, scoring 634 points in 651 games and leading them to their 23rd Stanley Cup in 1986.

6. Kent Nilsson

Another Swede whose talents were first displayed in the WHA, Kent Nilsson was one of the most skilled offensive players of his era. After two 107-point seasons with the Winnipeg Jets, the Magic Man continued to put up big numbers after entering the NHL with the Atlanta Flames in 1979. In 1980-81, the team’s first season in Calgary, Nilsson was third in league scoring with 131 points, still a franchise record. In 553 career NHL games, Nilsson scored 686 points.

5. Daniel Alfredsson

The heart and soul of the Ottawa Senators for the past decade, Daniel Alfredsson is the longest-serving captain in the NHL. Since winning the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year in 1996, the Sens winger has scored at a point-a-game clip, while at the same time establishing a reputation as one of the best defensive forwards in the game.

4. Borje Salming

The man who singlehandedly destroyed the stereotype of the “chicken Swede,” Borje Salming was signed by the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1973 and quickly established himself as one of the best two-way defencemen in the game. He played 1,148 games over 17 seasons, scoring 787 points and compiling more than 1,300 penalty minutes. As the first of his countrymen to make a mark in the NHL, the gritty Salming is owed a debt of gratitude by all the Swedish stars who followed him to North America.

3. Mats Sundin

In the two decades since he became the first European ever to be drafted first overall, Mats Sundin has been a poolie’s dream, scoring at least 72 points in every full season except his rookie campaign. But as the lone bright spot on some mediocre Leafs teams, Sundin never had the supporting cast to elevate his game among the NHL’s elite. His 1,349 points in 1,346 regular-season games makes him easily the highest-scoring Swede of all time, but he never reached the pinnacles — either individually or as part of a team — achieved by the two men ahead of him on this list.

2. Peter Forsberg

If not for a series of injuries brought on by his aggressive, atypically Swedish style of play, Peter Forsberg might be the No. 1 player on this list. When he wasn’t getting in the faces of his opponents, he was baffling them with his puck-handling skills, often dancing through or around defencemen to set up or score big goals. In his 13 seasons in the NHL, mostly with the Colorado Avalanche, Forsberg scored 885 points in just 706 games for an average of 1.25 points per game — a quarter-point more than Sundin. He also won two Stanley Cups, two World Championships, two Olympic golds and is the only Swede ever to win the Art Ross and Hart trophies.

1. Nicklas Lidstrom

Arguably the second-best defenceman in NHL history — behind Bobby Orr — Nicklas Lidstrom has won six Norris Trophies and four Stanley Cups in his 17-year career with the Detroit Red Wings. Despite continually drawing the toughest defensive assignments, the Wings captain has been one of the highest-scoring defencemen of his era, racking up 997 points in 1,330 games going into this season.