Hockey History
Sharks’ Quarter Century Teams Revealed, What Was My Vote?

The San Jose Sharks’ Quarter Century Team is out!
An NHL initiative, over the last month or so, every franchise in the league has unveiled Quarter Century First and Second Teams. Each team features three forwards, two defensemen, and one goalie, as voted up by media, retired players, and executives.
Before I get to how San Jose Hockey Now voted and my reasoning for a couple of the more controversial decisions, here are the San Jose Sharks Quarter Century Teams.
Keep in mind, this is a Quarter Century team, so only stats from Jan. 1, 2000 are to be considered.
First Team
Forwards
Patrick Marleau (1,411 Games-480 Goals-534 Assists-1,014 Points as a San Jose Sharks player in this century)
Joe Pavelski (963-355-406-761)
Joe Thornton (1,104-251-804-1,055)
Defensemen
Brent Burns (798-172-422-594)
Marc-Edouard Vlasic (1,302-83-295-378)
Goalie
Evgeni Nabokov (563 games-293 wins-.912 Save %)
Second Team
Forwards
Logan Couture (933-323-378-701)
Tomas Hertl (712-218-266-484)
Owen Nolan (230-86-103-189)
Defensemen
Dan Boyle (431-68-201-269)
Erik Karlsson (293-52-191-243)
Goalie
Martin Jones (327 games-170 wins-.907 Save %)
That’s exactly how I voted!
I think the biggest question marks for me were selecting Nolan and Karlsson.
For Nolan, it came down between weighing Nolan’s star-making 1999-00 campaign versus Jonathan Cheechoo’s Rocket Richard-winning year in 2005-06.
Of course, only Nolan’s 2000 portion of that season actually counts toward the vote. But a couple things gave Nolan the edge for me, in the end: Nolan became the San Jose Sharks’ first true league-wide star because of 1999-00. I still have my NHL 2001 PC game, which featured Nolan on the cover, and he’s still the only Shark to grace an EA NHL cover.
Also, Nolan drove the bus for one of the greatest upsets in playoff history that spring, scoring six goals in seven games as the eighth-seeded Sharks upset the President’s Trophy-winning St. Louis Blues.
He also provided a signature Sharks moment that series, as his center ice goal in Game Seven proved to be the game-winner.
For Karlsson, an exceptional season trumped all too.
Scott Hannan would’ve been a deserving partner for Dan Boyle in this vote too. Since 1999-00, Hannan was the only Sharks defenseman, besides Boyle, Burns, Karlsson, and Vlasic to register three-or-more 23-minute plus campaigns.
But Karlsson’s 2022-23, the first 100-point season for a defenseman since Brian Leetch in 1991-92, and the second Norris Trophy in San Jose Sharks history gave EK65 the edge. Karlsson was also sneaky brilliant in 2018-19, an injury-plagued campaign which still led to a Western Conference Finals appearance.