{"id":525650,"date":"2026-03-27T12:28:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T12:28:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/525650\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T12:28:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T12:28:13","slug":"macklin-celebrini-says-he-needs-to-be-better-as-san-jose-sharks-sputter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/525650\/","title":{"rendered":"Macklin Celebrini says he needs to be better as San Jose Sharks sputter"},"content":{"rendered":"

The San Jose Sharks\u2019 six-game losing skid has drastically hurt their chances<\/a> of making the playoffs this season. Barring a remarkable turnaround and some collapses by multiple teams directly ahead of them in the Western Conference standings<\/a>, it\u2019ll be a seventh straight year of no NHL postseason in Santa Clara County.<\/p>\n

Few Sharks\u2019 players are wearing the disappointment of likely missing the postseason<\/a> again more than Macklin Celebrini.<\/a><\/p>\n

The Sharks couldn\u2019t have asked for much more this season from Celebrini, 19, who enters Saturday\u2019s game against the Columbus Blue Jackets as the NHL\u2019s fifth-leading scorer<\/a> with 96 points. He will become just the fourth teenager in league history to lead his team in scoring at both 18 and 19 years old, following Dale Hawerchuk, Sidney Crosby, and Connor Bedard.<\/p>\n

Still, Celebrini, due to fatigue, injury, or simply opposing teams ramping up their defensive play, hasn\u2019t hit the scoresheet with the regularity<\/a> he did prior to the Olympic break. Perhaps he\u2019s finally, after nearly two years of stellar play, showing his age.<\/p>\n

The Sharks\u2019 2-1 overtime loss<\/a> to the St. Louis Blues on Thursday marked the fourth time in the last five games that Celebrini had been held without a point. He was also on the ice for both Blues\u2019 goals, including Dylan Holloway\u2019s winner<\/a> with less than three seconds left in the extra session.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of disappointing,\u201d Celebrini said. \u201cJust feeling like I\u2019m not doing my part to help the team, and also being on for goals, I mean, it\u2019s unacceptable, and I need to figure it out.\u201d<\/p>\n

In overtime with time winding down, Holloway picked up a loose puck to the left of the Sharks\u2019 net, skated toward the crease in front of a trailing Celebrini, and beat goalie Alex Nedeljkovic, roofing a backhand shot to send San Jose to its sixth straight loss (0-5-1).<\/p>\n

Nedeljkovic had to replace Yaroslav Askarov, who suffered an upper-body injury in the second period Thursday and did not return. His status for Saturday\u2019s game is unclear.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, it sucks,\u201d Celebrini said. \u201cThat game was so in reached and I need to come back harder. I just misjudged it, and he scored. It\u2019s just frustrating.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was trying to kind of come back, be patient for maybe a (trailing player), but I didn\u2019t know he was going to kind of cut in the middle there, and I also didn\u2019t feel like there was that much time left. I should have been there for the guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a sign of leadership from Celebrini, who will no doubt be the Sharks\u2019 captain one day, perhaps as soon as next season.<\/p>\n

But the Sharks, including the players, coaching staff, and front office, obviously have to figure out a way to do a better job in the future of supporting Celebrini, so he doesn\u2019t feel like he\u2019s letting everyone down when he doesn\u2019t score.<\/p>\n

The Sharks, during Celebrini\u2019s two-year career, now have a dismal record of 5-35-3, including 1-16-2 this season, when the North Vancouver native doesn\u2019t have a point.<\/p>\n

The Sharks (32-31-7) have also now scored only three even-strength goals and five goals total in their last four games. They\u2019ve also allowed 3.87 goals per game,<\/a> the second-highest total in the NHL, in 15 games since the break.<\/p>\n

Celebrini has played a ton of hockey and logged a ton of minutes over the last six weeks, starting with six emotionally draining games in 11 days for Team Canada<\/a> during the Winter Olympics in Milan.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s been followed by 15 games in 29 days for the Sharks, in which Celebrini has averaged a team-leading 22:11 in ice time. He had close to 23 minutes of ice time Thursday, including a shift of 2:14 in overtime.<\/p>\n

For the season, Celebrini is averaging more ice time per game (21:24) than fellow superstar centers Connor McDavid (21:08),<\/a> Sidney Crosby (20:46)<\/a>, or Nathan MacKinnon (17:03)<\/a> did in their second NHL years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have a superstar that drives them,\u201d Blues coach Jim Montgomery said of the Sharks before Thursday\u2019s game. \u201c(Celebrini) will to get to hard areas. He\u2019s got amazing skill; everyone sees that with his shot, his cutbacks, and everything. Kind of reminds me of (Jonathan) Toews with the way he goes to hard areas all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the loss, maybe the Sharks found something against St. Louis that they can take into Saturday\u2019s game in Columbus. The Blues were held to 22 shots, including four in the third period, and, per Natural Stat Trick,<\/a> to six high-danger chances. The Sharks created 11, including six in the third period.<\/p>\n

\u201cI liked our game,\u201d Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said. \u201cI thought we did some really good things tonight. Hopefully, a step in the right direction.<\/p>\n

\u201cDetails were good. We had seven chances 5-on-5 against, that\u2019s pretty good. We should win those games. Frustrating with the result, but a step in the right direction.\u201d<\/p>\n

For now, the Sharks will enter Saturday, the final stop on a three-game road trip, in 12th place in the Western Conference and six points back of the Nashville Predators for the second wild card spot, with two games in hand. San Jose remains eight points back of the Vegas Golden Knights for third place in the Pacific Division, with three games in hand.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrustrating with the result,\u201d Wennberg said. \u201cObviously, we had a chance to win this game. We\u2019re in this position right now, fighting for a playoff spot, and we\u2019re letting ourselves down.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not going to be easy. No one right now is giving up, at all. We have to look forward to the next game. There are opportunities, there are chances. We\u2019re playing some good hockey. The mindset\u2019s got to be the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

That holds true for Celebrini, who won\u2019t find things any easier against a Blue Jackets team that is 9-3-4 since the Olympic break, while allowing 2.63 goals per game, eighth-best in the NHL in that time.<\/p>\n

The Sharks need to go on a big run, with everyone on board.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can look at the positives,\u201d Celebrini said of Thursday\u2019s loss. \u201cIt sucks we\u2019re not getting the outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Jose Sharks\u2019 six-game losing skid has drastically hurt their chances of making the playoffs this season.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":525651,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5127],"tags":[230,5,501,4,519,168,5306,5305,1780,84],"class_list":{"0":"post-525650","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose-sharks","8":"tag-columbus-blue-jackets","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-macklin-celebrini","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-san-jose","13":"tag-san-jose-sharks","14":"tag-sanjose","15":"tag-sanjosesharks","16":"tag-sharks","17":"tag-st-louis-blues"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116301142723494844","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525650","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=525650"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525650\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/525651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=525650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=525650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=525650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}