On Thursday evening, San Jose Earthquakes midfielder and Designated Player Magnus Eriksson will drop the ceremonial first puck before the San Jose Sharks take on the St. Louis Blues at SAP Center.
“I think it’s a privilege and a big honor,” said Eriksson. “I’m really looking forward to it. Hopefully I don’t make a mistake.”
Eriksson certainly isn’t the first Quakes player to participate in a pregame ceremony for their cross-town neighbors. In fact, Chris Wondolowski got to open the doors for the Sharks players to come barreling out of the tunnel and onto the ice for a playoff game in May of 2016.
But what’s different about Eriksson is that hockey is truly in his DNA.
“I started playing hockey at a pretty young age, I don’t remember exactly when. I would play soccer during the summer and hockey during the winter. I believe I played both until I was like 15. At that age, it starts to get hard to play both so I had to choose one and I chose soccer.”
While he wouldn’t say for sure that he would have turned pro in hockey, he did admit to being a very talented center and goal-scorer for his teams.
“I may have been better at hockey at the time,” he joked. “But it was impossible to continue with both and soccer was my number one.”
