BOSTON — The San Jose Sharks’ Collin Graf has always been an underdog.
According to his mom, Terri Graf, a seven-year-old Graf didn’t make the first team that he had to try out for, the East Coast Wizards.
“At first, he was really disappointed, but he was seven, I’m not sure he really got it. Fortunately for him, we’re like, ‘Well, you can still play hockey, there’s another, another team here.’ We took him to that tryout, and he made that team,” she recalled. “I think at that point in his life, it was just, ‘I just want to play hockey.’”
Collin Graf remembers missing out on the Bedford, Massachusetts-based Wizards slightly differently.
“They wanted me to make it because the drive was closer,” Collin laughed, said of his father Robert and his mother.
Instead, Graf made the Assabet Valley Patriots, now known as the Patriot Hockey Club.
“The one he made and the one he didn’t make, they played against each other — but obviously, the one he didn’t make was a better team. They kind of always won, and he kind of always had a little chip on his shoulder.”
That chip on his shoulder has served Graf well throughout his life.
“As he got older, he was small, he was very small, so he tended to get a little bit overlooked because of his size,” Terri said.
Graf, unlike younger brother Justin, who’s scoring at a point-per-game pace for the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders right now, didn’t play in the USHL. The NHL skipped drafting him for three years. The most prestigious NCAA programs like Boston University and Michigan weren’t interested.
Even as a San Jose Sharks prospect, Graf, signed out of Quinnipiac, hasn’t received as much of the limelight, because of the likes of the 2024 No. 1 pick Macklin Celebrini, 2024 No. 11 Sam Dickinson, 2023 No. 4 Will Smith, and more.
But the 23-year-old has arrived this season as a bona fide middle-six winger and a top penalty killer. He’s tied for third on the Sharks with 16 goals.
Graf returns home on Thursday night, as the San Jose Sharks visit the Boston Bruins at TD Garden.
This is Graf’s second NHL homecoming game, but this time, he’s coming back as an everyday NHL’er, unlike as a rookie last season.
Terri and Collin Graf spoke to San Jose Hockey Now about his formative years, and Terri shared many pictures of a young Collin.
