Former Harvard hockey player Cavanagh ’05, played his first NHL game last week; tallied assist to Thornton

According to an ESPN.com box score from last Thursday night, just 36 seconds into an NHL game against the Los Angeles Kings, the San Jose Sharks’ Shane Joseph assisted future Hall of Famer Joe Thornton to give his team a 1-0 lead.

There was just one problem: no one named Shane Joseph was skating with the Sharks that night.

The mysterious skater was Tom Cavanagh ’05, who was called up to San Jose from the AHL’s Worcester Sharks for what coach Ron Wilson described to the Mercury News as an “emergency recall,” a move driven by a series of injuries to San Jose forwards.

Little did Cavanagh know when he heard the good news on Wednesday afternoon that he would be teaming up with Thornton and 500-goalscorer Jeremy Roenick for a score—and that, too, on his very first shift in the NHL.

“It was unbelievable,” Cavanagh says. “It was a dream come true just to play in my first game. And then to be in the starting lineup with those two guys made it even more special.”

The former Harvard standout, who was named Worcester’s team MVP for a season in which he scored over 50 points, was rewarded by Wilson with an opening shift at left wing. Cavanagh logged 13:54 in ice time in the 4-2 loss to the Kings, skating at all three forward positions.

Though he was sent back to Worcester as San Jose geared up for the Stanley Cup playoffs, Cavanagh used the call-up as motivation to continue his hard work—and he’s hungry for more.

“They just told me, keep working hard,” he says of the feedback from the San Jose coaching staff. “It was nice to get a taste of it—that helps me to become a better player.”