NHL fans are currently voting for the top 25 NHL players of the past 25 years through the NHL Quarter-Century Team Fan Vote presented by SAP.
The Fan Vote marks the second phase of the NHL Quarter-Century Team celebration during the 2024-25 season, following the reveal of each NHL team’s First and Second Quarter-Century Teams over the past six weeks. The players named to each team’s First Team, 191 stars in all, are eligible for selection in the Fan Vote.
Fans who wish to vote can do so at NHL.com/vote (fans can vote for 10 players per ballot and cast up to 10 ballots per day), or on social media platform X, using the hashtag #NHLQCTeam and one of the following: the player’s full name (with or without spaces); the player’s #firstandlastname; or the player's handle on X. Common misspellings will be counted, and reposts will count the same as native posts.
But why let fans have all the fun? NHL.com staff writers and editors did their own vote. Though the top 25 players, regardless of position, in the Fan Vote will comprise the NHL Quarter-Century Team presented by SAP and be revealed in the spring, we just couldn’t wait.
Here is the NHL.com Quarter-Century Team. The players, listed in alphabetical order with their corresponding teams from the ballot, were judged based on their NHL stats from Jan. 1, 2000, to Dec. 31, 2024.
Patrice Bergeron, Boston Bruins
For so long, Bergeron was underrated and underappreciated, though maybe not by those who played against him. In the end, the Bruins captain will be remembered for his 200-foot game, his grace and toughness on the ice -- including playing in Game 6 of the 2013 Stanley Cup Final with a punctured lung, separated shoulder and cracked ribs -- and the way he helped change the culture of the Bruins alongside Zdeno Chara. In 1,294 games in the quarter-century, Bergeron had 1,040 points (427 goals, 613 assists), won the Stanley Cup in 2011 and played in two more Cup Finals (2013, 2019), and won the Selke Trophy as the League's best defensive forward a record six times, plus the King Clancy Memorial Trophy for leadership and community contributions (2012-13) and the Mark Messier Leadership Award (2020-21).
Martin Brodeur, New Jersey Devils
It would be hard to overstate the impact of Brodeur on the past quarter-century, even though his career ended after 2014-15. Brodeur won the Vezina Trophy as the best goalie in the NHL four out of five seasons between 2002 and 2008 with the Devils, ceding the award only to Miikka Kiprusoff in 2005-06 (when Brodeur was runner-up). Add in winning the Stanley Cup in 2000 and 2003, and Brodeur's status as one of the greats of the past 25 years is unquestionable. And that's not even including the seven-plus years before Jan. 1, 2000, in which he was equally great.