Celebrini’s lower-body injury does not appear to be too serious with coach Ryan Warsofsky saying on Tuesday that the 20-year-old center is day to day.
Let’s hope day to day means exactly that, and Celebrini won’t miss more than a handful of games, because it is already his time to be the most valuable player to his team in the NHL.
Realistically, Celebrini likely would have been the Hart Trophy winner last season if the Sharks made the Stanley Cup Playoffs. He was fourth in the League with 115 points (45 goals, 70 assists). He had 56 more points than anyone else on his team.
Mario Lemieux in 1987-88 is the last of the five players who won the Hart Trophy in seasons that their teams did not make the playoffs dating to Billy Burch in 1924-25. Making the playoffs is technically not part of the criteria to win the award, but it might as well be.
Celebrini finished fourth in the Hart Trophy voting last season.
He’ll be first this season because the Sharks will make the playoffs and he, again assuming his injury isn’t serious, will be the biggest reason they do.
The Sharks are better this season so Celebrini shouldn’t have to score 115 points or more to get his team into the playoffs and win the Hart Trophy. That doesn’t mean he won’t. He certainly can, especially with two more games at his disposal.
And, to be fair, we already have 60 minutes of evidence of what the Sharks are without him.
They lost 5-0 to the Dallas Stars on Monday without him.
He needs to return ASAP.
The other two finalists will be, in order: Nathan MacKinnon, Colorado Avalanche; Connor McDavid, Edmonton Oilers