Yaroslav Askarov will be the San Jose Sharks\u2019 starting goaltender for the 2025-26 NHL season.<\/p>\n
The 23-year-old made headlines after his exit<\/a> from the Nashville Predators, stating he wanted more opportunity to be in the NHL. While he spent the majority of his first season with the Sharks in the AHL<\/a>, the pathway to the top was much more straightforward.<\/p>\n \u201cAbsolutely excited, and we\u2019re almost there, ready to go,\u201d Askarov said about the upcoming season.<\/p>\n Askarov played in 13 NHL games last season, finishing with four wins, a .896 save %, and a 3.10 GAA. He dealt with injuries at various points of the 24-25 season, including missing all of training camp.<\/p>\n Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.<\/p>\n \u201cDon\u2019t be injured. That\u2019s the big difference [for me]. It is always important to be with the boys on the ice [and] in the locker room,\u201d Askarov said. \u201cIt\u2019s always tough to be injured, because you\u2019re on the team, but in the same moment, you\u2019re not. You\u2019re somewhere behind. It\u2019s a great feeling to be with the team now.\u201d<\/p>\n The San Jose Sharks goalie emphasized the importance of being available during training camp, as it helps him get comfortable with the skaters in front of him. <\/p>\n \u201cWorking with your team, your D, they know you. You know them.\u201d<\/p>\n Askarov is getting coaching from Evgeni Nabokov, Ryan Miller, and Thomas Speer. While they all have their own style, the Sharks\u2019 netminder says the general coaching is all the same.<\/p>\n Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s great. The first day, three great people. That helps a lot, and they are good coaches,\u201d Askarov said. \u201cThat\u2019s a good combo: a good person, good coach. So you can\u2019t complain.\u201d<\/p>\n Askarov\u2019s approach to off-season improvement was simple<\/p>\n Askarov told reporters that he worked on staying healthy and rounding out his game. <\/p>\n \u201cPretty much everything. It\u2019s a lot of stuff. We have to work,\u201d the Sharks\u2019 goalie said. \u201cWe have to grow up every day. Life\u2019s moving forward [and] you have to move forward too if you want to be playing in the best league.\u201d<\/p>\n GM Mike Grier brought in veteran goalie Alex Nedeljkovic<\/a> to be the veteran presence behind Askarov. Nedeljkovic has been a starter in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and has been demoted to the AHL in his career. His experience should provide Askarov with any answers or advice he\u2019s seeking.<\/p>\n Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.<\/p>\n Even with the new responsibility of being the San Jose Sharks\u2019 starting goalie, Askarov won\u2019t let his approach change.<\/p>\n \u201cI would say [to] keep the same mentality,\u201d Askarov said. \u201c[I\u2019m] trying to keep focused on what I can control.\u201d<\/p>\n Askarov told reporters he wants to get into a couple of Sharks preseason games, but he\u2019s using all of the training camp scrimmages to get into game shape.<\/p>\n Read more news and stories about the San Jose Sharks on\u00a0Sharks Hockey Digest<\/a>! Bookmark the page and follow Sharks Hockey Digest on Twitter @SharksHKYDigest<\/a>!<\/p>\n Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Yaroslav Askarov will be the San Jose Sharks\u2019 starting goaltender for the 2025-26 NHL season. The 23-year-old made…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155283,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[9846,64,63,7523,575,7527,103656,85,68803],"class_list":{"0":"post-155282","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-alex-nedeljkovic","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-nashville-predators","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-san-jose-sharks","14":"tag-sj-sharks","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-yaroslav-askarov"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}