{"id":344765,"date":"2026-06-02T23:09:34","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T17:39:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/?p=344765"},"modified":"2026-06-02T23:09:34","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T17:39:34","slug":"zach-werenskis-response-to-winning-1st-norris-trophy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/2026\/06\/02\/zach-werenskis-response-to-winning-1st-norris-trophy\/","title":{"rendered":"Zach Werenski&#8217;s response to winning 1st Norris Trophy"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"article-3823984\">\n<p>The 2025-26 season didn&#8217;t end the best way the Columbus Blue Jackets had hoped, as they simply missed out on the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Still, blueliner Zach Werenski had a stellar season. He set a franchise record with 26 multiple-point games, while also ending tied for second in franchise history in points in a single season. This led to Werenski being named a finalist for the Norris Trophy, together with Cale Makar and Rasmus Dahlin.<\/p>\n<p>Now, Werenski has won the award, given out to the defensive player who shows the best all-around ability at his position. He learned about winning the award along with his family, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nhl.com\/news\/topic\/nhl-awards\/zach-werenksi-wins-2026-norris-trophy-best-defenseman-in-nhl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">giving the proper response<\/a>, per Nicholas J. Cotsonika of NHL.com.<\/p>\n<p>Werenski was gathered with members of his family at his home on Sunday. The gathering is a traditional occurrence for the family, as they accomplish that each Sunday. On this Sunday, Werenski, and his wife, Odette, were celebrating with their two and a half week old son, Hudson. Meanwhile, his brother and his wife had just welcomed their secon child the night before.<\/p>\n<p>NHL Productions got here by to do a feature on Werenski. He was told it was a couple of Father&#8217;s Day feature. The Jackets blueliner was giving an interview along with his back to the patio.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously, I would not be here without her and all the pieces she does for me,\u201d Zach said, referring to Odette. \u201cAnd I&#8217;m really looking forward to this next chapter, being a dad.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While speaking, Glenn Stants from the Hockey Hall of Fame snuck up behind him, holding the trophy. Werenski didn&#8217;t notice. This led to the interviewer attempting to drop hints for Werenski to show around, finally asking about momentos he would want to point out his son.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPerhaps show him your name engraved on a trophy?\u201d the author said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYeah, perhaps,\u201d the Jackets star responded.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, Werenski turned around and saw the Norris Trophy.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>The right response for a family man<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>\u201cI&#8217;m confused, to be honest with you, guys. It&#8217;s incredible,\u201d Werenski said before addressing his family. \u201cThanks, guys.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was a special moment for the star player, whose father got here up and hugged him after Zach realized he had won the award.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat is what it&#8217;s all about,\u201d Zach said. \u201cI mean, I would not be here without them. Obviously, in a way, it&#8217;s a person award. But without them, without my teammates, without an amazing support staff and system, I would not be on this position, and I do know that. For them to be here today and revel in this with me, it means all the pieces.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was the primary time that Werenski won the award. He <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/reporterchris\/status\/2061832162702217593\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">finished with 113 first-place votes<\/a>, while Cale Makar, Rasmus Dahlin, Evan Bouchard, and Moritz Seider rounded out the highest five. The defender also knew it was a competitive field for the award this 12 months.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou could possibly name five, six, seven more \u2018D&#8217; that might easily be deserving of this trophy,\u201d Werenski said. \u201cIt&#8217;s an amazing time for defensemen within the NHL and in hockey, and I&#8217;m just grateful to be an element of it. I feel all of us push one another to be higher. I do know last 12 months once I didn&#8217;t win, I used to be excited for this 12 months. I used to be excited to be higher and push myself, and I feel like all of us try this.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Now, Werenski gets to have a good time each the award and being a father for the primary time. Next season, he&#8217;ll hope for a return to the Stanley Cup playoffs, along with his family within the stands.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The 2025-26 season didn&#8217;t end the best way the Columbus Blue Jackets had hoped, as they simply missed out on the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  Still, blueliner Zach Werenski had a stellar season.  He set a franchise record with 26 multiple-point games, while also ending tied for second in franchise history in points in a single season.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The 2025-26 season didn&#8217;t end the best way the Columbus Blue Jackets had hoped, as they simply missed out on the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Still, blueliner Zach Werenski had a stellar season. He set a franchise record with 26 multiple-point games, while also ending tied for second in franchise history in points in a single [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":344766,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[338],"tags":[6696,17643,488,7046,52423,1488,7238],"class_list":["post-344765","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-1st","tag-norris","tag-reaction","tag-trophy","tag-werenskis","tag-winning","tag-zach"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344765"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344765\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":344768,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344765\/revisions\/344768"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebiztoday.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}