{"id":208939,"date":"2025-09-25T12:26:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T12:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/208939\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T12:26:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T12:26:10","slug":"san-jose-sharks-with-yaroslav-askarov-hope-for-better-goaltending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/208939\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks, with Yaroslav Askarov, hope for better goaltending"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2013 The San Jose Sharks feel good about the changes they\u2019ve made <\/a>to their forward group and defense corps, believing that the handful of veterans they\u2019ve added up front and on the back end can make them a more competitive team.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Sharks are also optimistic that they\u2019ve overhauled their goaltending for the better,<\/a> with Yaroslav Askarov now taking on a full-time NHL role and the more experienced Alex Nedeljkovic<\/a> providing some competition for the No. 1 job.<\/p>\n

Of course, stats-wise, there was nowhere to go but up. The five goalies<\/a> the Sharks used last season combined for both the third-worst team save percentage (.881) in the NHL and the highest-goals against average (3.74). The advanced metrics<\/a> were not much better, if at all.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe needed to solidify our goaltending position,\u201d Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said, \u201cand I thought we did a good job getting a guy like (Nedeljkovic) to compliment (Askarov) as a young pro.\u201d<\/p>\n

But as is the case with the Sharks\u2019 skaters, questions remain.<\/p>\n

Specifically, how many games might the promising Askarov, 23, be able to play this season as he makes the full-time leap to the NHL and can Nedeljkovic, 29, bounce back after an up-and-down final year <\/a>with the Pittsburgh Penguins?<\/p>\n

How will the workload be split between the two? Can one take control of the net and make more than 50 starts?<\/p>\n

As the No. 1 goalie for the Nashville\u00a0Predators\u2019 AHL affiliate<\/a> in Milwaukee, Askarov, between the regular season and playoffs, played 60 games in 2022-23 and 51 the following year. Acquired by the Sharks from the Predators in Aug. 2024, Askarov shined in the AHL, but a lower body injury limited him to 41 games total between the Sharks and Barracuda.<\/p>\n

Nedeljkovic last season had a career worst .894 save percentage in 38 games with the sinking Penguins, who missed the playoffs for the third straight season and arguably didn\u2019t offer their goalies much support. In 179 career games over the past five seasons, Nedeljkovic, acquired from the Penguins in July, had a .903 save percentage<\/p>\n

\u201c(Askarov\u2019s) got to stay healthy, we\u2019ve got to manage him and there\u2019s a lot of data that goes with that,\u201d Warsofsky said. \u201cNed\u2019s obviously been around the league for a few years now, and I know he\u2019s not going to hand (the No. 1 job) over. He\u2019s a competitive guy, as is Askarov.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, we\u2019ll see how it plays out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Askarov and Nedeljkovic figure to get work in the first month of the season as the Sharks play 16 games over the first 31 days,<\/a> a stretch that includes games on back-to-back days four times.<\/p>\n

For the season, the Sharks play games on back-to-back days 16 times.<\/p>\n

CELEBRINI WATCH: Center Macklin Celebrini, who missed two days of training camp last week with what was described as an illness, practiced Wednesday but was again held out of contact drills.<\/p>\n

Celebrini returned to practice on Tuesday but worked on faceoff techniques as other forwards battled for the puck along the boards with the team\u2019s defensemen at both ends of the ice. Wednesday, Celebrini worked on his shooting as he faced goalies Gabe Carriere and Matt Davis.<\/p>\n

Celebrini said Tuesday that the illness he dealt with last week was not something he felt before camp began on Sept. 18. It\u2019s unclear when Celebrini will be able to take contact again or if he might be available to take part in Friday\u2019s home preseason game against the Vegas Golden Knights.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got a pretty good plan on how we want to approach this,\u201d Warsofsky said of Celebrini\u2019s ailment. \u201cSo each day he does a little bit more, and then we\u2019ll let him go.\u201d<\/p>\n

OTHER INJURIES: Defenseman John Klingberg (upper body) skated Wednesday morning apart from the main training groups but it still appears doubtful that he\u2019ll be available to play Friday. Klingberg sustained the injury in the Sharks\u2019 3-0 win over the Golden Knights on Sunday when he played over 21 minutes and scored a second-period power-play goal. \u2026 Haoxi (Simon) Wang, drafted 33rd overall by the Sharks in June, has a lower body issue and did not skate Wednesday. Warsofsky said it was more of a maintenance day for Wang and that the issue is \u201cnot too serious.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2013 The San Jose Sharks feel good about the changes they\u2019ve made to their forward group…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208940,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5127],"tags":[2616,2617,5,2614,1180,4,5192,519,168,5306,5305,2618,1780,2619,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-208939","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose-sharks","8":"tag-bay-area","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-inside-sports","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-pm-report","15":"tag-san-jose","16":"tag-san-jose-sharks","17":"tag-sanjose","18":"tag-sanjosesharks","19":"tag-santa-clara-county","20":"tag-sharks","21":"tag-south-bay","22":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115264933275523872","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}