Elvis Iginla was 18 when he left Lagos, Nigeria, in the mid-1970s and joined a relative in Alberta. For years, he worked and saved, going to school at nights and on the side, eventually making it through law school and becoming an attorney in Edmonton.

	Jarome Iginla led the league with 52 goals and 96 points.

Along the way, he married Susan Schechard, who was born in the United States but whose family had moved to the Edmonton area.

Their son, Jarome, was born in 1977.

Jarome Iginla's grandfather, Richard Schechard, liked to take him to the outdoor rink down the street from the Schechards' house. Jarome was 7 years old the first time, and before long, it was apparent that this was a budding hockey prodigy.

"My grandfather was a big sports fan and so was my mom," Jarome recalled.

"They were all for it, and I found I really enjoyed it."

When Iginla played for Memorial Cup champion Kamloops, it was obvious he was destined for stardom. But his breakthrough season at age 24 has taken him to the next level -- that level at which the prefix "super-" must be attached to the "stardom" -- and there isn't much room for debate.

His racial background?

Too much will be made of that.

Here, the most significant thing that can be said about Iginla's background -- on the day he most likely will step to a podium in the Air Canada Centre in Toronto and accept the Hart Trophy -- is that it is the latest example of how the children of immigrants to Canada can take to the sport. It is a different sort of diversity than the fans of checkmarks and condescension and political correctness trumpet.

Last year's Hart winner, Colorado's Joe Sakic, is the son of immigrants from Croatia, Marijan and Slavica Sakic, and was raised speaking Croatian in his Vancouver-area home. In Canada's gold-medal victory over the United States in Salt Lake in February, Sakic and Iginla had two goals apiece and Paul Kariya -- whose father was born in Japan before moving to Canada -- had the other.

The NHL's international talent pool is one of its strengths.

So is Canada's diversity, which is more significant than any figures churned out by the U.S. Census Bureau because the grassroots popularity of the sport in Canada means kids of virtually every ethnic, racial and economic background play the game -- if they so choose. And if it comes down to a matter of preference, Canadian kids are more likely to pick hockey.

Iginla isn't a lock for the Hart tonight -- cases can be made for the other finalists, goalies Patrick Roy and Jose Theodore -- but he's the favorite. The confession is that as the season was winding down, the leaning here was go with Roy, whose work over the first half of the regular season especially was remarkable, keeping what then was a very ordinary Colorado team among the elite. Even in this season of league-wide offensive doldrums, if Roy had played only his usual solid regular season, Colorado wouldn't even have been ensured of a playoff spot. And Theodore was even more indispensable for the Canadiens in the sense that he virtually carried them into the postseason.

OK, the Flames didn't make the playoffs. Those who want to analyze the award definitions and disqualify Iginla on that alone -- if he was so valuable to his team, why didn't Calgary play beyond mid-April? -- are working too hard at it. They're of the same school of thought that tried to turn Hemingway into allegory instead of storytelling. (Even if some of these gotta-make-the-playoffs-to-have-Hart proponents believe Hemingway was a Blackhawks' left wing in the late '40s.)

During a season in which goals were scarce, Iginla's 52 were amazing. The fact that he scored them -- and had a league-leading 96 points -- for a rotten team without being a disgustingly selfish, one-way player is remarkable.

He deserves the Hart.

Yes, team success should enter into Hart consideration. But the Flames were underpowered and unsuccessful. Without Iginla, they would have been disgustingly inept, not to mention unwatchable. In that sense, he was a difference-maker, and that sort of difference-making is, in its own fashion, as impressive as the work of a player who is the marquee star on a strong roster.

Five years ago, Iginla finished second to Bryan Berard in Calder Trophy voting, but as recently as last fall, it seemed inconceivable that he would be in position to be sketching out a possible Hart Trophy acceptance speech. In September, he was invited to the Canadian Olympic team orientation only as a replacement for Sakic when the Avalanche captain discovered he wouldn't be able to skate in the camp in Calgary because of a groin muscle problem.

But a few months later, Iginla's addition to the team was an obvious choice -- obvious long before Wayne Gretzky all but confirmed it in a national television interview before the final selections were made.

And at 24, he still has a tremendous upside. He also is an eloquent spokesman for the sport -- with a toughness of style and spirit that complements his cordiality and class off the ice.

In other words, if he wins tonight, he will not be a one-hit wonder.

Terry Frei of The Denver Post is a regular contributor to ESPN.com. His book, "Horns, Hogs, and Nixon Coming," will be published by Simon and Schuster in December.