SPRINGFIELD, Mass. … The American Hockey League announced today that Patrick Brown of the Providence Bruins is the 2025-26 winner of the Fred T. Hunt Memorial Award as the AHL player who best exemplifies the qualities of sportsmanship, determination and dedication to hockey.
The award is voted on by coaches, players and members of the media representing each of the league’s 32 member cities.
Brown, a 12th-year pro from Bloomfield Hills, Mich., has captained the Bruins to the Macgregor Kilpatrick Trophy as the AHL’s regular-season champions in 2025-26, entering the final weekend of the season with a record of 54-14-2-0 (110 points). He has skated in all 70 games to date while setting career highs with 20 goals, 34 assists and 54 points, as well as a plus-36 rating that ranks second in the entire league.
In his second season as Providence’s captain, Brown was also selected to wear the “C” for the Eastern Conference at the 2026 AHL All-Star Classic in February. He previously served as captain of the Charlotte Checkers for three years – including their 2019 Calder Cup championship season – and was selected as the first captain of the Henderson Silver Knights for their inaugural 2020-21 campaign. Brown has totaled 111 goals and 175 assists for 286 points in 571 career AHL games with Providence, Henderson, Chicago and Charlotte.
Undrafted out of Boston College, Brown originally signed as a free agent with the Carolina Hurricanes in 2014 and has gone on to skate in 164 National Hockey League contests with Carolina, Vegas, Philadelphia, Ottawa and Boston, tallying 10 goals and 16 assists.
This award, which was first presented in 1978, honors the late Fred T. Hunt, a long-time contributor to the American Hockey League who won three Calder Cup championships as a player and three more as a general manager during a career spent primarily with the AHL’s Buffalo Bisons and the NHL’s Buffalo Sabres. Previous winners of the award include Ross Yates (1983), Glenn Merkosky (1987, ’91), Bruce Boudreau (1988), Murray Eaves (’89, ’90), John Anderson (1992), Tim Tookey (1993), Ken Gernander (1996, 2004), Randy Cunneyworth (2000), Mike Keane (2007), Bryan Helmer (2011), Jake Dowell (2014), Tom Kostopoulos (2016), Craig Cunningham (2017), Brett Sutter (2019), John McCarthy (2020), Cal O’Reilly (2021, ’25), Logan Shaw (2023) and Spencer Knight (2024).
In operation since 1936 and celebrating its 90th-anniversary season this year, the American Hockey League continues to serve as the top development league for all 32 National Hockey League teams. Nearly 90 percent of all players competing in the NHL are AHL graduates, and through the years the American Hockey League has been home to more than 100 honored members of the Hockey Hall of Fame.
The winner of the 2025-26 Louis A.R. Pieri Memorial Award (outstanding coach) will be announced on Monday.