The wait was long, when you take time to comprehend it.
It’s been more than three months since Macklin Celebrini, the No. 1 pick in the draft, first pulled a teal San Jose Sharks jersey over his head, with his No. 71 already emblazoned on it. Five months since he and the Sharks learned their intertwined fate at the draft lottery. A year since general manager Mike Grier positioned the Sharks for that lottery with a low-talent club set to endure a brutal season, daring to dream for a transformative payoff.
The moment that the organization and a patient, renewed fan base have been waiting to see is almost here, when the Sharks host the St. Louis Blues in their season opener on Thursday. First, though, everyone got a look at Celebrini in the preseason, and it produced some anxiety.
Jonathan Becher was in the arena last week. Celebrini isn’t hard to spot, with his energetic and determined skating carving up the ice. In the second period, he made a rush to the net, a golden scoring chance in his sights. Becher, the Sharks’ team president, could feel the surge in the crowd.
And then Celebrini took a spill as his chance was turned away. The player already tabbed as the Sharks’ top-line center and next franchise face slowly got up after a hard crash in the corner.
“I don’t think you can print the words that went through my head,” Becher told The Athletic this week.
A collective sigh of relief, after what Becher called “a tense couple of moments,” came Monday, when Celebrini practiced after not playing in San Jose’s final two exhibitions. Initial reports were that the apparent leg injury was not serious, and concern abated about the 18-year-old.
Excitement has returned to San Jose after three diminishing years with Bob Boughner as coach, followed by a bleak two-season run under David Quinn, assisted by Grier’s roster teardown, which resulted in a league-worst 19-54-9 record. What the Sharks have seen from Celebrini thus far makes them confident he is ready to handle the pressure of being the face of the franchise at such a young age, before having even played a regular-season game. But they’re also here to help.
Celebrini, the youngest player in NCAA hockey last season, became the fourth freshman to win the Hobey Baker Award, following Paul Kariya, Jack Eichel and Adam Fantilli. Celebrini led Boston University to the Frozen Four while ranking second in goals (32) and third in points (64) in the NCAA. Celebrini entered the 2023-24 season as the presumed No. 1 pick and ended it as the unchallenged choice.
But the way Celebrini put his fingerprints all over BU games wasn’t the only thing that made Grier deeply covet him. Grier and his former Terriers teammate Jay Pandolfo, now the BU head coach, discussed his impact on the program.
“I think Mike knew because he watched him a lot,” said Pandolfo, who played 15 years in the NHL. “He had seen him in practice. I just told Mike that he’s going to elevate your franchise just by the way he does things on and off the ice. He elevated our group last year just from a practice standpoint because of how hard he practiced and never took a rep off. That can certainly help a team.
“I saw it when I was coaching in Boston with Zdeno Chara and (Patrice) Bergeron and (Brad) Marchand, how they practiced every day can elevate a group. Macklin’s going to do that in San Jose. It’s just how he’s wired. I think he’s going to be great for that organization.”
New Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky is finding out what Pandolfo learned in one year around Celebrini.
“When you talk to him, it’s like you’re talking to a seasoned vet that’s won two Stanley Cups,” Warsofsky said. “He just has this driven mindset.
“Well, he’s a great kid. A kid that you’d want your daughter to marry. He’s that good of a kid. And he cares about his craft. He cares about his teammates. He cares about the organization, which is obviously step No. 1. He’s ultra-competitive. It’s what we need.
“But we’re going to have to support him. There’s going to be ups and downs in his season. He’s a special player. He’s a special person. There’s things we’re going to do as an organization to protect him — and I think Mike did a good job of bringing in the veterans to help surround him with some guys that are good character players. That have won Stanley Cups.”
These Sharks won’t come near those heights anytime soon. But they gave Celebrini more talent to work with. Grier signed longtime goal-scorer Tyler Toffoli to be his linemate and traded for defenseman Jake Walman, who’ll also join Celebrini on the top power-play unit. Free-agent third-line center Alex Wennberg could take some of the tougher defensive matchups that Celebrini might ordinarily get. Fan favorite and 2019 playoff hero Barclay Goodrow was brought back as a waiver claim.
But the presence of Joe Thornton and others off the ice could be the biggest help to Celebrini as he navigates his rookie season. Celebrini is living with Thornton, the former Sharks legend. Fellow rookie Will Smith, the No. 4 draft pick in 2023, is doing the same with Patrick Marleau and his family. The Sharks are determined to provide comfort and support for their franchise-shaping bookends.
“We can’t put all the pressure on one 18-year-old,” Becher said. “Odds are, he’s going to live up to it. If you’ve seen what he’s done, he’s much more mature than an 18-year-old, both in his style of interaction and his play. I’ve never seen an 18-year-old backcheck as well as Celebrini does. There’s a lot to love there. But it can’t be all about him. It has to be about the core. That is the spirit of hockey.
“It actually works out really well for us that he and Smith come up at the same time. That (goalie Yaroslav) Askarov will be right behind them. That they’re only two years younger than the (William) Eklunds and the (Fabian) Zetterlunds. I feel like, as much as he may be the face, we’re in a better shape than maybe other teams. … We have lots of people. We’re protecting from him having to save the franchise by itself.”
ESPN analyst Ray Ferraro knows the Celebrini family well. Ferraro’s younger sons with wife Cammi Granato ran in similar circles with Macklin and his siblings as they grew up. He remembers when Macklin played soccer before committing fully to hockey. “I don’t know if he was really a soccer player, but his athleticism was off the charts,” Ferraro said. “He was just so good at anything he did.”
Celebrini won’t be the first 18-year-old phenom to play in the NHL, and he’ll endure what Ferraro says will be “the trials and the problems” that were the same for others who had to find their way, no matter how talented. But Ferraro said Celebrini’s maturity and preparation exceed that of a lot of prospects his age.
“As strong as Macklin is now, it’s not even going to be close what he’s going to be in two years,” he said. “His awareness of the game is already in an exceptional level. But in 100 games, it’s going to look completely different.
“He’s the best player on the team and he’s 18 years old. There’s enormous weight to that. Just look at Connor Bedard. (He) was by far the best player on the Chicago Blackhawks last year and a lot of nights, you just get your lunch handed to you. It’ll be a long season in San Jose, but the only way you can rebuild is to put enough young people together in the same age group and hope they mature in good numbers when they get to be 21, 22 years old.”
The Sharks are happy with Celebrini’s early days, but believe greatness is coming. (Stan Szeto / USA Today)
What the Sharks don’t want is Celebrini feeling as though he needs to be their savior. They want him to be himself and play his game. His impact on games will come naturally.
“There are expectations, and the expectations from a lot of people are going to be unrealistic,” San Jose center Nico Strum said. “That’s just the way that sports are, because we’ve had some tough couple of years in San Jose and the fans are excited about something. And deservedly so. They’ve been waiting for a player, you know, of this caliber maybe since they drafted Tommy (Hertl).
“For us, from an organizational standpoint — coaching, management, teammates — the biggest thing is that I personally want him to feel comfortable. I want him to come to the rink every day and feel like he is a part of the team. That he doesn’t have to walk on eggshells, you know? I want him to have fun, to laugh, to make jokes with the guys. And I think the sooner he feels comfortable in his skin every day around the rink, the sooner he’s going to translate it onto the ice.”
In his two preseason games, Celebrini looked at home in the Sharks’ lineup. He scored a power-play goal in one and flung an impressive cross-crease pass to Toffoli for an easy tap-in. Sturm said that only “elite players in the NHL make that play.”
There will be his share of tough nights. But there also may be no need to worry.
“He’s had very high expectations on him for a long time and he’s dealt with them all very well,” Pandolfo said. “They were talking about, when he was 14, that he was going to be the projected No. 1 pick three years from now. And that’s a heavy burden on a kid. To me, he separated himself and no question was going to be No. 1.
“That tells you something about him right there where he can handle the pressure.”
Winning the draft lottery jolted San Jose. But it wasn’t just about the Sharks getting the most celebrated player. The franchise already had a connection with him. Before heading to famed prep program Shattuck St. Mary’s in Minnesota, Macklin played his age-13 year in the Jr. Sharks AAA program after his father, Rick, moved the family to the Bay Area when he joined the NBA’s Golden State Warriors as their director of sports medicine and performance.
Hockey fans in Silicon Valley have now adopted Celebrini as one of their own. Thousands attended the draft party at SAP Center to watch Thornton announce Celebrini’s name in Las Vegas. Days later, at the Sharks’ development camp, Celebrini’s first scrimmage nearly filled the team’s 4,200-seat AHL arena. Teal-colored towels were put on every seat.
That doesn’t happen for just any prospect. Becher knows Celebrini can be a marketing home run for the Sharks but is careful about letting him grow into that large role organically, through his play. “If you notice us, we don’t talk about him winning any trophies,” Becher said.
“It’s obviously a question we ask ourselves, and it’s hard to know because we’ve never been through the situation before,” Becher added. “There’s no denying that getting the No. 1 overall pick adds icing to the cake. And there’s no denying with Macklin — and there’s a hometown story there, the tie to the Warriors, the fact that his parents live here, all that increases it.
“Would we have gotten 80 percent of that with a different guy? Probably. I’m making up that number. I don’t know. But there’s no denying the fact that because it’s Macklin, because he’s very easy to talk to, because his story is so local, that helps. I can’t deny that.”
Sidney Crosby, the player Celebrini idolizes and has drawn some comparisons to, knows about coming into the NHL at age 18 with great hype, as part of a franchise eager to restore its prominence. The Pittsburgh Penguins drafted Crosby No. 1 in 2005, and he did bring them back from the abyss. Crosby is a fan of Celebrini’s game, and feels he has a good support system around him, noting that Thornton also is a former No. 1 pick who dealt with high expectations.
Crosby wants Celebrini to enjoy the process. And his first night itself.
“Obviously, you’re excited,” Crosby said. “You’re nervous. Those are all typical emotions to go through given the situation. That’s what makes it so memorable. You’re trying to make the most of it. Having fun with it and enjoying the fact that you’re playing in the NHL.”
It begins Thursday. The wait will soon be over.
(Rob Rossi of The Athletic contributed to this report.)
(Photo of Macklin Celebrini: Ezra Shaw / Getty Images)
