Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman Zach Werenski was named to the National Hockey League\u2019s 2025-26 First All-Star Team, the club and league announced today. Voting for the league\u2019s postseason all-star teams were conducted by the Professional Hockey Writers Association at the end of the regular season.<\/p>\n
Werenski, who was awarded the 2025-26 James Norris Memorial Trophy as the league\u2019s top defenseman on June 2, earned First-Team honors for the second-straight campaign. He joins goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky (First Team in 2012-13 and 2016-17) as the second player in franchise history to be named to multiple All-Star Teams. Goaltender Steve Mason (Second Team in 2008-09) and defenseman Seth Jones (Second Team in 2017-18) have also received postseason All-Star Team honors.<\/p>\n
The 28-year-old blueliner registered 22 goals and 59 assists for 81 points, including 18-41-59 at even-strength, with 260 shots on goal and a +7 plus\/minus rating on 26:37 of ice time in 75 games in 2025-26. He finished second in the NHL in average ice time, 14th-T in even-strength points and 15th in multi-point efforts (26). He also led league defensemen in multi-point efforts, even-strength goals (tied) and shots on goal and ranked second in points, points-per-game (1.08) and even-strength points, third-T in goals and fourth-T in assists.<\/p>\n
The 6-2, 214-pound defenseman also led Columbus in assists, points, points-per-game, multi-point efforts and shots on goal and finished third in goals. He set a single-season franchise record for multi-point outings and tied the franchise mark for assists for the second consecutive season. He also registered the third-highest total for even-strength points and fourth-most points in a single campaign in club history.<\/p>\n
A native of Grosse Pointe, Michigan, Werenski became the fifth U.S.-born defenseman in NHL history to record multiple 80-point campaigns in 2025-26 after notching 23-59-82 in 81 games in 2024-25. He is the third to accomplish the feat in consecutive seasons, joining Phil Housley (1991-92 to 1992-93 with Winnipeg) and Brian Leetch (1990-91 to 1991-92 with NY Rangers). He\u2019s also the third American blueliner to notch consecutive 20-goal campaigns along with Housley (six-straight from 1986-92) and Reed Larson (five-straight from 1979-84).<\/p>\n
Werenski is the franchise\u2019s all-time leader in assists and ranks second in points, third in games played, fourth in shots on goal and fifth in goals with 135-330-465 and 1,846 shots in 642 career games in 10 NHL seasons with the Blue Jackets. He leads all NHL defensemen in even-strength goals (104) and ranks third in goals, fourth in shots on goal and eighth in points since making his NHL debut in 2016-17. He was selected by Columbus in the first-round, eighth overall, at the 2015 NHL Draft.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman Zach Werenski was named to the National Hockey League\u2019s 2025-26 First All-Star Team, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":732538,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-732537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/732537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=732537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/732537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/732538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=732537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=732537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=732537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}