- Editor's Note: Sheng Peng will be a regular contributor to NBC Sports California’s Sharks coverage. You can read more of his coverage on San Jose Hockey Now, listen to him on the San Jose Hockey Now Podcast, and follow him on Twitter at @Sheng_Peng.
“You can’t replace Erik Karlsson.”
Logan Couture isn’t going to pretend otherwise.
“He’s a one-of-a-kind player, he does special things on the ice that not many, maybe Cale Makar is the other one that can do some of the stuff that he does on the ice,” the San Jose Sharks captain told the San Jose Hockey Now Podcast last week.
Get a weekly recap of the latest San Francisco Bay Area housing news. Sign up for NBC Bay Area’s Housing Deconstructed newsletter.
That’s a sentiment that his teammates agreed with.
“I hate to see him go,” Nico Sturm told San Jose Hockey Now. “We lose a Norris defenseman with a 100-point season.”
“Offensively impossible to replace a player like him,” Kaapo Kahkonen echoed.
News
“The year he had last year speaks for itself,” San Jose Sharks head coach David Quinn said. “He did everything he could do on and off the ice to make us a better organization. We’re gonna miss him.”
Like Quinn said, the Sharks also will miss Karlsson off the ice. The star defenseman has been a mainstay in teal since the Ottawa Senators traded him to San Jose in Sept. 2018. Only Couture, Tomas Hertl, Kevin Labanc, and Radim Simek remain from that 2018-19 Western Conference Finals squad.
