Almost every player who will appear in the United States Hockey League next season was born after Joe Pavelski had played in his last Waterloo Black Hawks game.
Compared to a current junior-aged skater, Pavelski's NHL career literally represents a lifetime.
The former Black Hawks captain has now officially retired after 18 pro seasons.
Pavelski's consistency was as remarkable as any one thing he did on the ice. He rarely missed games. Even approaching age 40, Pavelski was in the Dallas Stars' lineup for every game during each of the last four regular seasons.
He also had some of his most productive years in that time. In 2021/22, Pavelski set a new career high for assists (54) and points (81). The next winter, he was +42 (fourth best in the league). Pavelski's numbers from 2023/24 (27 goals, 40 assists, 67 points, +12) certainly don't represent a substantial drop off on a Dallas team filled with young offensive talent. If a couple of games had turned out differently in late May, Pavelski and the Stars might have been in the Stanley Cup Final for the second time in four years.
Overall, Pavelski will leave active competition as one of the best American players to ever appear in the NHL. Fewer than 10 U.S.-born skaters have scored more goals (476), recorded more points (1,068), and dressed for more games (1,332).
None of it was guaranteed.
Hindsight brings Pavelski's amazing accomplishments into focus, but also blurs the doubters he proved wrong during the past two decades.
For example, as an 18-year-old Black Hawk in 2002/03, Pavelski had the best season by any Waterloo player in nearly a decade. He paced the Hawks in goals (36), points (69), and plus/minus (+26). His goal total led the entire USHL, while he placed among the top five in the other two categories. Pavelski was the league's Rookie of the Year, and he did all of that while playing 30 home games on Young Arena's oversized ice sheet.
Still, the prevailing wisdom was that he didn't skate well enough to be effective at the highest level. The result: 204 players were chosen ahead of him during the 2003 NHL Draft, and the San Jose Sharks got one of the biggest late-round steals since the draft settled into its current seven-round format.
In some ways, what the Black Hawks accomplished during Pavelski's next season in Waterloo was a metaphor capturing the essence of his entire career. The Hawks would not have been the trendy pick to win the Clark Cup at midseason, nor at the end of the schedule when they became the last team to earn a playoff bid. After upsetting the division champion Chicago Steel, the prospects were still daunting. Going into the Final series against the regular season champion Tri-City Storm, Hawks Head Coach P.K. O'Handley publicly speculated that the odds against Waterloo would be a-million-to-one.
"We've been the underdog so much this year," O'Handley went on to tell the Waterloo Courier, "People wrote us off early, and I think our team likes it. Nobody really expects much from us, so we can just play."
"There is no doubt [internally]," Pavelski said amidst the Tri-City series. "Everyone in here still believes."
Pavelski and the Hawks got it done. They won the Clark Cup series in four games. The finale was one of Waterloo's proudest hockey moments during the more than 60 years the city has put a team on ice. Pavelski set up Joel Hanson's series-winning goal and tied for the team lead with a dozen playoff points.
After claiming a championship in his sophomore season at the junior level, he repeated the feat two years later in the NCAA with the Wisconsin Badgers.
Then it was on to pro hockey that fall. Eight months after his last college appearance and less than three years from the deafening celebration at Young Arena, Pavelski scored in his first game for San Jose on November 22, 2006.
The remarkable moments never seemed to stop with the Sharks and later for the Stars, not to mention as a member of U.S. National teams, and particularly the 2010 Olympic squad. An overtime goal by Sidney Crosby was all that separated Pavelski's medal from being silver rather than gold when he returned from Vancouver that year.
The Black Hawks retired Pavelski's #8 in January of 2009. He was on hand for the ceremony during the NHL All-Star break.
"It's everybody's dream to play in the NHL," he told sportswriter Jim Nelson. "I didn't know how true or realistic for me that dream was…But I grew as a player. I learned. I matured and eventually understood what it was going to take to reach the next levels."
The players following Pavelski to Waterloo now - 20 years after his last USHL game - only know him as a successful NHL standout. If they listened closely during the NHL Draft last month, they might have heard about Pavelski being picked in the seventh round, then going on to a career better than many first rounders. It's a nugget which is likely to be part of draft commentary for the foreseeable future.
Most of those new young Hawks hoping to play at Young Arena are likely to cite the game's superstars as their favorite players and biggest influences: Crosby, Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews. Those three #1 picks each have mesmerizing talent, and all drew acclaim long before their respective NHL debuts.
Hopefully Waterloo's 2024/25 Black Hawks took time to watch Joe Pavelski too. He is the living proof that they can grow into the players they dream of being. They can embrace the underdog role and drown out the doubters. They can spend a lifetime in the game doing things which will make the whole hockey world take notice.
