San Jose Sharks Trivia
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49 free San Jose Sharks trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The San Jose Sharks were born when the owners of the Minnesota North Stars swapped that team for a Bay Area expansion franchise, and the name only won because 'Blades' sounded too much like a weapon. This Sharks trivia quiz covers all of it: the Cow Palace years, the NHL-record 71 losses, the 58-point jump that followed, Jamie Baker's Game 7 winner in Detroit, Owen Nolan, Evgeni Nabokov's Calder, the Joe Thornton trade and his Hart Trophy season, Jonathan Cheechoo's 56 goals, the 2009 Presidents' Trophy and the first-round flop that followed. It then follows the Setoguchi comeback against the Kings, the Burns and Karlsson blockbusters, the 2016 run to the Final under Peter DeBoer, the five-minute major against Vegas in 2019, Patrick Marleau's retired 12, Mike Grier's hiring, Karlsson's 101-point Norris season and Macklin Celebrini breaking Thornton's franchise scoring record. There are questions on S. J. Sharkie, the Red Triangle logo, the Shark Tank and the Golden Seals too. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedic and reference sources before publishing, and each question carries a citation. For more, try our NHL trivia and hockey trivia pages.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The Gund brothers sold which team and received an expansion franchise, creating the Sharks?
Minnesota North Stars
Minnesota North Stars: the Gunds had asked to move that club to the Bay Area, and the league refused, then let them sell it, start a new team in San Jose and take some of its players along.
Q 02Whom did the Sharks take second overall, behind Eric Lindros, with their first-ever draft pick in 1991?
Pat Falloon
Pat Falloon led the first-year Sharks in scoring, but two players taken within the next four picks, Scott Niedermayer and Peter Forsberg, reached the Hall of Fame and he never did.
Q 03Which Bay Area team, later moved to Cleveland, was the region's last NHL club before the Sharks?
California Golden Seals
California Golden Seals: nine NHL seasons in Oakland brought no winning record and thin crowds, so the club left in 1976 and the Bay Area went 15 years without a team.
Q 04Where did the Sharks play their first two seasons while their permanent San Jose home was being built?
The Cow Palace
The Cow Palace in Daly City was the same old livestock hall the NHL had rejected as a home for its 1967 Bay Area expansion club, yet the Sharks filled nearly every seat there.
Q 05Which former Norris Trophy defenseman was the Sharks' first captain and later their general manager?
Doug Wilson
Doug Wilson came from Chicago a month before the first game, and within weeks of becoming general manager in 2003 he drafted a future Sharks captain in the seventh round.
Q 06Which unwanted NHL single-season record have the Sharks held since 1992–93?
Most losses
Most losses: the 1992–93 Sharks dropped 71 of 84 games, 17 of them in a row, yet one season later the same club reached the playoffs and knocked out top-seeded Detroit.
Q 07Despite finishing last, the early Sharks led the NHL in what off the ice?
Merchandise sales
Merchandise sales: the club had dressed in teal, the trendy colour of 1990s sport, and its sweater with a shark biting a hockey stick became a hit however badly the team played.
Q 08How did mascot S. J. Sharkie make his debut in January 1992?
Emerging from a Zamboni
Emerging from a Zamboni proved the safer entrance: in 1999 he got stuck on a rope while rappelling from the rafters, and the game could not start until he was hoisted to safety.
Q 09Which goalie played 74 games as the 1993–94 Sharks reached their first playoffs?
Arturs Irbe
Arturs Irbe, the Latvian whom fans called Archie, started nearly every night as the Sharks improved by 58 points, and he was in goal when the eighth seed eliminated top-seeded Detroit in seven games.
Q 10Who scored the Game 7 winner at Joe Louis Arena in 1994 as the eighth-seeded Sharks stunned Detroit?
Jamie Baker
Jamie Baker pounced late in a 2–2 game when rookie goalie Chris Osgood's clearing attempt landed on his stick, and the top-seeded Red Wings were out in the first round.
Q 11Which defenseman was traded to Colorado for Owen Nolan in 1995-96?
Sandis Ozolinsh
Sandis Ozolinsh went to Colorado in October 1995 and won the Stanley Cup there the following spring, while Owen Nolan stayed in San Jose for years and became the Sharks' captain.
Q 12Whom did the Sharks select second overall in the 1997 draft?
Patrick Marleau
Patrick Marleau left San Jose twice and came back both times, and it was as a Shark in 2021 that he passed Gordie Howe's record for NHL games played.
Q 13Which goalie won the Calder Trophy as the NHL's top rookie for San Jose in 2000–01?
Evgeni Nabokov
Evgeni Nabokov, a 219th-overall pick born in Kazakhstan, held the job for ten seasons and in 2002 shot the puck into Vancouver's net to score a goal himself.
Q 21Which All-Star defenseman came to San Jose from the Minnesota Wild in a 2011 trade and later won the Norris Trophy?
Brent Burns
Brent Burns was moved up to forward by the Sharks for parts of two seasons, then went back to defense and in 2017 was voted the NHL's best at the position.
Q 22Which rival came back from 3–0 down to eliminate the Sharks in 2014, only the fourth such comeback in NHL history?
Los Angeles Kings
Los Angeles Kings: they finished the comeback with a 5–1 win in Game 7 and went on to lift the Stanley Cup, while the Sharks began the next season without a captain.
Q 23Which 49ers home hosted the Sharks' 2015 outdoor game, a 2–1 loss watched by 70,205 fans?
Levi's Stadium
Q 14Who went to Boston with Brad Stuart and Wayne Primeau in the 2005 trade that brought Jumbo Joe to San Jose?
Marco Sturm
Marco Sturm made it three players for one, and the centre San Jose got back went on to lead the whole league in scoring that same season.
Q 15Which Shark won the Rocket Richard Trophy with 56 goals in 2005-06?
Jonathan Cheechoo
Jonathan Cheechoo took off once a late-November trade gave him a new centre, and he edged Jaromir Jagr for the league's goal-scoring title.
Q 16Which eighth seed knocked out the Presidents' Trophy-winning Sharks in the 2009 first round?
Anaheim Ducks
Anaheim Ducks: the eighth seed needed only six games, turning the tables on a franchise that had made its name in 1994 as an eighth seed knocking out the top team.
Q 17Which veteran rejoined the NHL with San Jose in 2008-09 after a five-year absence?
Claude Lemieux
Claude Lemieux, 43 and a former playoff MVP, worked his way back through a club in China and the minor leagues, played part of one season and retired for good.
Q 18Which veteran defenseman did the Sharks name captain in 2009 after stripping the 'C' from their 1997 second-overall pick?
Rob Blake
Rob Blake, re-signed at 39, wore the 'C' for a single season, took the Sharks to the conference final and then retired, so the captaincy changed hands again.
Q 19Which Cup-winning Blackhawks goalie signed with San Jose in September 2010?
Antti Niemi
Antti Niemi had swept the Sharks in that spring's conference final on his way to the Cup, but Chicago walked away from his arbitration award and San Jose signed the goalie who had beaten it.
Q 20Whose overtime goal capped the Sharks' comeback from 4–0 down in Game 3 of a 2011 playoff series?
Devin Setoguchi
Devin Setoguchi scored three minutes into overtime after the Sharks had wiped out the whole 4–0 deficit with five goals in the second period alone.
Levi's Stadium, which had opened only months earlier, got the game a year after outdoor hockey at Dodger Stadium had proved a success in California.
Q 24Which coach, hired in 2015, took San Jose to its first Stanley Cup Final the next spring?
Peter DeBoer
Peter DeBoer had been fired by another NHL club five months before the Sharks hired him, and for the second time in his career he reached the Final in his first season with a team.
Q 25Which goalie, acquired from Boston in June 2015, carried the Sharks to the Stanley Cup Final the next spring?
Martin Jones
Martin Jones, a career backup until then, was traded twice in five days that June, and within a year he was starting in the first Stanley Cup Final in Sharks history.
Q 26Which team beat the Sharks in the 2016 Stanley Cup Final?
Pittsburgh Penguins
Pittsburgh Penguins: Sidney Crosby's team won in six games, so the first Final in the Sharks' 25-year history ended with the Cup being handed over on their own ice in San Jose.
Q 27Which Finnish star joined the Sharks by trade in March 2001?
Teemu Selanne
Teemu Selanne, who had set the NHL rookie record with 76 goals, played two full seasons in teal, then turned down a $6.5 million option to sign for less with Colorado in the hope of winning a Stanley Cup.
Q 28Whose injury drew the five-minute major behind the Sharks' 2019 Game 7 comeback against Vegas?
Joe Pavelski
Joe Pavelski, the captain, was helped off the ice; trailing 3–0, his teammates scored four times during the penalty, and Barclay Goodrow won the series in overtime.
Q 29Which Sharks forward's contract was terminated in 2022 for violating AHL COVID-19 protocol?
Evander Kane
Evander Kane cleared waivers and signed with Edmonton, which gave him a four-year extension that summer, while his grievance against the Sharks was settled later in the year.
Q 30Mike Grier, hired in July 2022, made history as the NHL's first what?
Black general manager
Black general manager: Mike Grier had played three seasons for the Sharks as a winger, and he came back 13 years later to run the club.