Tale of Twos: Shepard Adds Back-to-Back Champion to his Resume Yet Again

Jubilation and elation. Monday night at Giant Center will live on forever in Bears Nation after a
sold-out crowd saw their local hockey team lift the Calder Cup in back-to-back seasons for the
franchise’s 13 th title.

The team’s backbone, goaltender Hunter Shepard, held down the fort well during this
postseason. Despite facing some significant adversity in the series against Cleveland Monsters
and Coachella Valley Firebirds, he came through when called upon.

What if I told you, though, that this isn’t the first time the 2023 Jack A. Butterfield Trophy
winner won back-to-back championships?

Before signing his first contract with the Bears, Shepard first burst on to the college hockey
scene during the 2017-18 sophomore season at Minnesota-Duluth. It was a successful campaign
– which featured a 1.91 goals against average, a .925 save percentage and a national title where
he stopped 19 of 20 shots to eliminate Notre Dame at the Xcel Energy Center in Saint Paul, MN.
The next year, the Bulldogs leaned on him as a leader in between the pipes. After posting a
stellar 1.76 goals against average and a .923 save percentage, he backstopped the Bulldogs to a
second consecutive title with a 3-0 shutout win over the Cale Makar-led Massachusetts
Minutemen in Buffalo, NY.

Shepard started 115 consecutive games for the Bulldogs. He was selected as an American
Hockey Coaches Association (AHCA) All-American twice, received the National Collegiate
Hockey Conference (NCHC) Goaltender of the Year Award twice, was named NCHC
Tournament MVP and a finalist for the Mike Richter Award.

When you see this, combined with his success in Hershey, it’s no secret: this guy is a winner.
Just recently, the Capitals traded goaltender Darcy Kuemper to the Los Angeles Kings in
exchange for center Pierre-Luc Dubois. This opens up an opportunity for him to seize the backup
netminder role out of camp behind current starter Charlie Lindgren. With his success in
Chocolatetown, he deserves the opportunity to graduate to the NHL full time.

If we have seen Shepard play his last game in Hershey, we can hang our heads high knowing
how proud he made Bears Nation for bringing the cup back to its rightful owner in consecutive
seasons.

In the coming days, I will have an article on the offseason and breakdown some of the roster
decisions the Capitals and Bears need to make ahead of the 2024-25 season.

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