NHL Alumni
Although Örnsköldsvik is a small town with an approximate population of just 29,000, the city has produced numerous born-and-raised NHL talents through the Modo system. The hockey-centred town has six indoor rinks, with the Fjällräven Center boasting regular attendances of 7,000 for Modo home games, marking nearly a quarter of the population.
Anders Hedberg was one of the first Swedes to succeed in the NHL, in the 1970s. In the early 1990s, forwards Peter Forsberg and Markus Näslund emerged out of Modo's junior system and were drafted 6th and 16th overall by the Philadelphia Flyers and Pittsburgh Penguins, respectively in the 1991 NHL Entry Draft. They became arguably Modo's first NHL stars. Forsberg went on to win the Calder Memorial Trophy as NHL rookie of the year in 1995 with the Nordiques and the Hart Memorial Trophy as NHL MVP with the Colorado Avalanche in 2003, while Näslund won the Lester B. Pearson Award as NHL MVP chosen by the players in 2003. Furthermore, Forsberg and Näslund finished first and second in league point-scoring for the Art Ross Trophy in 2003. Besides the two league-leaders, the 2002–03 season featured 13 NHL players originating from Modo, as well as seven others who were born and raised within a couple miles of Örnsköldsvik. Forward Niklas Sundström also played alongside Forsberg and Näslund with Modo and was drafted 8th overall in the 1993 NHL Entry Draft by the New York Rangers.
Eight years after Forsberg and Naslund's draft selections, identical twins Daniel and Henrik Sedin were drafted second and third overall, joining Näslund in Vancouver. In 2005–06, Näslund, Henrik and Daniel finished first, second and third, respectively, in Canucks team-scoring. In fact, since the 1998–99 season, no Canucks player has led the team in scoring besides either Näslund, Henrik or Daniel. During the 2009–10 season, Henrik became the second former Modo player to win the NHL's Art Ross Trophy as the league's leading scorer and the Hart Memorial Trophy as league MVP. The next year fellow Canuck and twin brother Daniel Sedin would go on to win the Art ross trophy making it the first time in any NHL history that two brothers win scoring titles consecutively.
In 2008–09 defenceman Victor Hedman began drawing considerable attention from the NHL and was eventually selected second overall in the 2009 NHL Entry Draft by the Tampa Bay Lightning, matching Daniel Sedin as the highest-drafted Modo player in team history.
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