In Joe Pavelski, the Sharks Have Finally Found the Captain They've Been Waiting For

Linus Videll, the 204th pick in the 2003 NHL Entry Draft, logged just 30 points with Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod of the KHL this season and has never played a single NHL game. Thomas Bellemare, selected 206th, last played in 2013 for the Trois Rivieres Caron and Guay in the middling North American Hockey League. He never suited up in the NHL, either.

These are the types of players you would expect to find among the 7th round class from a draft that happened almost 13 years ago. But sandwiched between those picks was one of the shrewdest late-round selections in the last 20 years: San Jose Sharks captain and Conn Smythe candidate Joe Pavelski.

At only 5'11", the Waterloo Black Hawks (USHL) center wasn't high on many teams' lists in 2003, at a time when size was valued over skill. The other knock on Pavelski was his below-average skating ability. That was enough: undersized and slow didn't equal the best forecast heading into the draft. It wouldn't have surprised anyone had Pavelski ended up like Videll and Bellemare. He hasn't.

Pavelski wasn't sitting by the phone, waiting for his call on draft day."I think he was fishing when he got drafted," says P.K. O'Handley, longtime Coach and General Manager of the Black Hawks. "There was some question whether he'd get drafted at all."

But over the last decade, the little 7th rounder that could has made himself into one of the NHL's elite centers. Playing in relative obscurity—San Jose is not exactly a major media market in hockey—Pavelski has been remarkably steady, even as players his age have begun to fall off. Only two players have scored at least 37 goals in each of the last three years. One is Alexander Ovechkin. The other is Pavelski, who has scored 41, 37, and 38.

Pavelski has even avoided getting caught up in the narrative of the Sharks underperforming in the playoffs—one that has afflicted Pavelski's teammates, and predecessors in the Sharks captaincy, Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau. Pavelski, in defiance of that tradition, leads all playoff scorers in goals.

He's also helped in ways that are harder to quantify. Those close to the team say that Pavelski is a quiet leader who has taken time this season to grow into his new role as captain of the team. "He's a guy who gets the respect of everyone in the room without trampling on anyone's feelings along the way," says San Jose Mercury News Sharks beat reporter Curtis Pashelka.

After losing the first two games of the finals, that approach served the Sharks when Game 3 went to overtime. Sharks center Logan Couture told Pashelka that the mood in the locker room between the third period and overtime of Game 3 was the "same thing" as previously. The Sharks had been winless in overtime in the playoffs. "Calm," Couture said. "No one really says much. Just go out there and shoot the puck. Anything can happen."

The NHL playoffs are a time when breakout stars tend to emerge—think of Tyler Johnson in 2015—and underappreciated stars fix their place as part of the league's elite, as Anze Kopitar did in 2014. Pavelski's playoffs, including his league-leading 13 goals, are not quite either of those things.

This is the biggest stage Pavelski has played on in the NHL; he is a two-time Olympian with Team USA, but the Stanley Cup is a different thing. Go back throughout his career, though, and you'll see this is also the natural trajectory for a lifetime champion. Pavelski won championships at the midget, high school, junior, and college levels. He won a silver medal in the 2010 Olympics. And through all that, Pavelski remained unobtrusively excellent.

"I would be surprised if Joe Pavelski had a game like Brent Burns, because of his personality," says TSN analyst Ray Ferraro. "[Pavelski's game and personality] kind of fit together, don't they?"

To truly understand how Pavelski made a name for himself, you'll have to go back through his early days as a perennial champion.

Mike Eaves was Pavelski's coach at the University of Wisconsin for his two seasons, including when they claimed the 2006 NCAA Championship. He says that Pavelski returned to the campus every summer and that two to three times a week he'd be on the ice by 7 a.m., either by himself, or with another teammate that he'd asked to come work on something specific. "These tip-in goals that he does?" says Eaves. "He does those all summer."

Eaves acknowledges that Pavelski lacked speed and size when he became a Badger. At first glance, Pavelski might not have seemed like a future superstar. It was the subtleties in Pavelski's game that eventually swayed his coach, and showed that he could be something special.

"During the course of the game you'll see moments and say 'Wow, that was special,'" Eaves reflects. "And it can be as simple as being able to catch a pass on your backhand, bring it to your forehand and then make a nice saucer pass. And watching Joe do those exact things you acknowledge that while he may not be the fastest there were little indications, these little subtleties that indicated that there was something special there."

Ferraro, a center who logged 1258 NHL games and stands an inch shorter than Pavelski, also understands what Pavelski has had to overcome. "For a little guy, the one thing you can't do is play with the puck and hold onto the puck and hope to beat someone with speed. You have to be strong over top of it," Ferraro says, adding that Pavelski has mastered having a lower center of gravity and protecting the puck.

Of course, it is Pavelski's on-ice vision and awareness that is his greatest attribute. As he has for the past three seasons, Pavelski has spent these playoffs showing off his ability to know from the position of the puck where he needs to go next—and eventually, the puck gets there.

Six years ago, the subtleties of Pavelski's game gave the United States at opportunity for their first Olympic gold medal in hockey in 30 years. While Pavelski didn't get credit for an assist on Zach Parise's game-tying goal with 25 seconds left in the third period against Canada, he did win the faceoff to give his team possession, batted a clearing attempt out of mid-air, and played the puck to a more optimal position in front of the net.

Six years later, Pavelski has again returned to the spotlight. Despite his white-hot Conference Finals against the St. Louis Blues, in which he put up nine points and 22 shots in six games, he hasn't figured offensively into the Finals yet. Those waiting for Pavelski to dramatically reverse the Sharks' fortunes shouldn't hold their breath. If the Sharks can climb back into the series, it will be because Pavelski does things the way he always has: quietly, brilliantly, with little fanfare, and as much away from the puck as with it.