SAN JOSE – The San Jose Sharks are all too used to being out of the playoff picture at this juncture of the season and were probably guilty in recent years of simply wanting to play out the string.
While the last-place Sharks are in the same predicament this season with two months remaining and the NHL trade deadline around the corner, that type of lukewarm attitude – considering the state of their rebuild and the younger players on the roster — is now something they desperately want to avoid.
“We’ve got 25 games to really push and be competitive,” Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said Tuesday. “I thought there was, in the last couple years, you just try to get through the games and get to the end of the season. We’re going try and compete.”
History suggests it will be a challenge, particularly with the Sharks (15-35-7) expected to unload more bodies before the trade deadline on March 7. In the last two seasons, the Sharks, after each trade deadline, had a combined record of 8-25-6.
Each year, the Sharks endured a nine-game losing streak and lost nine games by three or more goals.
While there’s no guarantee the Sharks’ record down the stretch will be any better this season, they at least want to avoid those same morale-draining lopsided losses. Part of that is because of the relative youth on the roster, including developing rookies Macklin Celebrini, Will Smith, Shakir Mukhamadullin, Collin Graf, and other Gen Z players like William Eklund and Henry Thrun.
Regularly getting crushed might not help anyone’s development.
Warsofsky said this year’s roster will “probably get younger as we get going here throughout the week and the next couple weeks, as the deadline comes and goes, and I’m sure that we want to see some guys that are (in the AHL) with the (Barracuda) before they hopefully go on their playoff run.
“So, there’s going to be mistakes. There’ll be puck-play mistakes. There’ll be systematic mistakes. As coaching staff, we’re going to keep teaching and coaching them and pushing winning habits and foundation habits. So when we get into next year, (we can) hit the ground running.”
With the NHL pausing its schedule to hold the 4 Nations Face-Off, the Sharks’ practice on Tuesday marked the first time they had been together as a team since their 8-3 loss to the Dallas Stars on Feb. 8. The loss was the Sharks’ 10th in their last 11 games, as they’ve fallen to 32nd and last place in the NHL’s overall standings.
The break was desperately needed — physically and mentally — as the Sharks have won just five of 27 games since trading goalie Mackenzie Blackwood to the Colorado Avalanche on Dec. 9.
“It was great,” Sharks rookie center Macklin Celebrini said. “It benefited me, for sure. I feel like it helps to get a little bit of time to kind of refresh after the first half of the year.”
The Sharks are scheduled to practice each day this week before they leave on Saturday for a daunting seven-game road trip, which starts with games in Calgary on Sunday and Winnipeg on Monday.
On Tuesday morning, Warsofsky met with the Sharks’ leadership group and articulated his expectations for the season’s final two months.
“We’re not here to mess around. We want to try and get better every day,” Sharks winger Tyler Toffoli said. “We’ve been saying that all year. We’ve just got to get our game consistent and it starts with practice.”
The Sharks welcomed injured veteran centers Alexander Wennberg and Nico Sturm back to practice Tuesday. Sturm, on injured reserve since Jan. 22, has missed eight straight games with a lower-body ailment, and Wennberg has missed four straight games with an upper-body issue. Both were full participants in Tuesday’s practice and, per Warsofsky, are on track to be available to play this weekend.
Wennberg and Sturm, who have a combined 34 points this season, will not solve all of the Sharks’ issues but should help provide some stability to a floundering team that just traded leading scorer Mikael Granlund and top-pair defenseman Cody Ceci.
In Tuesday’s practice, Wennberg centered the second line with Fabian Zetterlund and Will Smith on the wings, and Sturm, a pending UFA who could be on the move before the deadline, centered the third line with wingers Luke Kunin and Collin Graf.
“A lot has happened, from really the Blackwood would trade on,” Warsofsky said. “You trade our starting goaltender, then you lose (Granlund and Ceci), and not just good players, but good people, and that affects you. We got kind of punched in the gut there a little bit, and it affected our game.
“Even though we were competing at times, games got away from us at times. And now we’ve got to reset. Those guys have moved on; we’ve got to move on, too. That’s the business we’re in.”
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INJURY UPDATES: Warsofsky said forward Nikolai Kovalenko (upper body) will likely be available to play again before defenseman Jan Rutta (lower body) can return. Kovalenko, who missed the last three games before the break, skated Tuesday morning, and if he isn’t on the team’s flight to Calgary on Saturday, he could join the team partway through the road trip, Warsofsky said.
Rutta, a pending UFA, missed the last six games before the break, and his injury is taking longer than expected to heal. Warsofsky said it’s too soon to say whether Rutta can eventually join the Sharks on the trip, which lasts until March 6.
NOTABLE: The Sharks recalled Graf and Jack Thompson from the Barracuda on Tuesday. Thompson was paired with Shakir Mukhamadullin during practice.
