{"id":312587,"date":"2025-11-20T08:17:15","date_gmt":"2025-11-20T08:17:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/312587\/"},"modified":"2025-11-20T08:17:15","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T08:17:15","slug":"macklin-celebrini-san-jose-sharks-unsatisfied-as-they-face-l-a-kings-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/312587\/","title":{"rendered":"Macklin Celebrini, San Jose Sharks unsatisfied as they face L. A. Kings"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2013 A day after he completed his third career NHL hat trick<\/a> with an overtime goal, etching his name alongside some of the NHL\u2019s all-time greatest players, Sharks center Macklin Celebrini<\/a> had already moved on.<\/p>\n

Sitting just outside of a playoff spot,<\/a> there\u2019s too much left for the Sharks to try to accomplish, too much room for improvement with three-quarters<\/a> of the season remaining.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, you can never be disappointed with a win. When you get two points, it\u2019s always a good thing,\u201d Celebrini said Wednesday, less than 14 hours after his overtime goal lifted the Sharks to a 3-2 victory<\/a> over the Utah Mammoth at SAP Center. \u201cBut I think the way we\u2019re playing right now, we\u2019re disconnected, and you\u2019re not going to continue to win like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Celebrini\u2019s team-leading 13th goal of the year at the 2:52 mark of overtime Tuesday gave the Sharks their fifth win in seven games.<\/p>\n

It also helped Celebrini become just the fourth teenager in NHL history to reach the 30-point mark in 20 or fewer games of a season, joining Wayne Gretzky,<\/a> Mario Lemieux, and Sidney Crosby,<\/a> who are first, eighth, and ninth, respectively, on the league\u2019s all-time scoring list.<\/p>\n

Going into Thursday\u2019s game with the Los Angeles Kings<\/a>, Celebrini\u2019s 30 points represent the most for any Sharks player \u2013 regardless of age \u2014 through the first 20 games of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s special,\u201d Sharks defenseman Vincent Desharnais said Tuesday. \u201cI think everyone in here and everyone in this building kind of sees how special he is as a player, and as a human being as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe always wants to get better every day. I\u2019m sure next skate, he\u2019s going to be one of the first guys on the ice to work on something else. It\u2019s impressive to see, and it inspires everyone to want to follow him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Celebrini and the Sharks (9-8-3) know that the way they played Tuesday, even as they ended a two-game slide, is not conducive to long-term success, as they made too many mistakes with the puck, leaving them on defense for too long rather than being on the attack.<\/p>\n

The Sharks, per Natural Stat Trick,<\/a> allowed 11 high-danger changes on Tuesday during 5-on-5 play \u2014 slightly more than the 9.55 they\u2019ve averaged this season \u2014 and created only six.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t give up a ton of 5-on-5 chances,\u201d Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said Wednesday. \u201cBut we gave a lot of almost chances.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt starts with our forecheck. That\u2019s where we\u2019ve had success. We\u2019ve got to stop pucks up, we\u2019ve got to get numbers around it. We want to have our (defensemen) gapped up. It should be a pretty clear picture, and we should see all five guys in that picture when we go back and watch it on video. So we just weren\u2019t there enough last night.\u201d<\/p>\n

Celebrini scored at even-strength at the 1:47 and 5:58 marks of the first period, giving the Sharks an early 2-0 lead. But after a sloppy second period, the Sharks allowed two third-period goals to JJ Peterka, including the tying goal with 2:51 left in regulation, as his shot from 40 feet away got between goalie Yaroslav Askarov\u2019s upper body and left arm to tie the game 2-2.<\/p>\n

On his overtime power play goal, Celebrini took a pass from William Eklund, stickhandled the puck near the top of the circles, and fired a shot past Utah goalie Vitek Vanecek for his 13th goal of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, we get a fortunate power play, and we score on the 4-on-3,\u201d Warsofsky said Wednesday. \u201cTo be honest, there were times in that game (last night) that looked like last year. So that\u2019s something we have to fix, and we need to be better.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to have maturity in our game. \u2026 We\u2019re not playing that well, and we need to get it on the rails here quickly. There\u2019s a lot of hockey ahead of us. We\u2019re playing with fire. We\u2019re making it extremely hard on ourselves to win hockey games.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sharks gladly took Tuesday\u2019s win but want to reestablish some of the connectivity that had led to a 6-0-1 streak from Oct. 30 to Nov. 11.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just need to get on the same page,\u201d Celebrini said. \u201cI think the understanding is it\u2019s good that we\u2019re finding ways to get points here and there, but it\u2019s not good enough for the long haul.\u201d<\/p>\n

Celebrini\u2019s first two goals on Tuesday represented the Sharks\u2019 first goals during 5-on-5 play since Adam Gaudette scored in the second period of San Jose\u2019s 3-1 win<\/a> over the Florida Panthers on Nov. 8.<\/p>\n

Now the Sharks have to get some more production from their power play, which is 4-for-37 over the last 11 games. They went 1-for-5 with the man advantage on Tuesday and missed an opportunity to take a 3-1 lead late in the third period after Utah took a delay of game penalty on an unsuccessful coach\u2019s challenge after a disallowed Mammoth goal due to goalie interference.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe did some (good) things that we\u2019ve talked about. We just got to do it more consistently,\u201d Warsofsky said. \u201cIt needs to be shift after shift after shift. When we get a power play, our mentality needs to be attack, and let\u2019s go. Our guys are trying. It\u2019s not like they go out there and say, \u2018Hey, let\u2019s just pass it around the outside, not create any shots.\u2019 We\u2019ve got to get everyone on the same page and get more connected.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2013 A day after he completed his third career NHL hat trick with an overtime goal,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":312588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5127],"tags":[5,145,501,3375,4,519,168,5306,5305,1780,768,279],"class_list":{"0":"post-312587","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose-sharks","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-los-angeles-kings","10":"tag-macklin-celebrini","11":"tag-mario-lemieux","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-san-jose","14":"tag-san-jose-sharks","15":"tag-sanjose","16":"tag-sanjosesharks","17":"tag-sharks","18":"tag-sidney-crosby","19":"tag-wayne-gretzky"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115581042265121823","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312587","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=312587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/312588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}