{"id":899355,"date":"2026-09-20T21:50:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-20T21:50:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/899355\/"},"modified":"2026-09-20T21:50:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T21:50:09","slug":"san-jose-sharks-macklin-celebrini-practice-new-look-power-play","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/899355\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks, Macklin Celebrini practice new-look power play"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2013 Before the Sharks played the Anaheim Ducks in their first preseason game<\/a> Sunday afternoon, most of the players who will actually be on San Jose\u2019s NHL roster<\/a> to start the year stayed back to work at the team\u2019s practice facility.<\/p>\n

Along with individual and 2-on-1 rushes and some contract drills below the faceoff dots, the Sharks also spent considerable time on special teams, offering a glimpse of two new-look power-play units.<\/a><\/p>\n

With a team day off on Monday, the Sharks wanted their NHL group to build cohesiveness and connectivity on the power play and penalty kill before their next preseason game at home on Tuesday against the Vegas Golden Knights.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWith having the majority of our veteran group here,\u201d Sharks assistant coach Brian Wiseman told Bay Area News Group on Sunday, \u201cwe wanted to take advantage of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The top power-play unit featured forwards Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith on the flanks, defenseman Luca Cagnoni on the point, center Alexander Wennberg at the net front, and Igor Chernyshov in the bumper position.<\/p>\n

The second power-play unit also had some new faces, with Ivar Stenberg on one flank and Mason Marchment at the net front. Also out there were Michael Misa on the right flank, Tyler Toffoli at the bumper, and Dmitry Orlov on the point.<\/p>\n

The Sharks\u2019 power play rose from 26th in the NHL (18.6%) in 2024-25 to 16th last season<\/a> at 21.2%.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s relevant because nine of the top 10 teams in power-play percentage in 2025-26 made the playoffs, with the Stanley Cup champion Carolina Hurricanes fourth in the NHL at 24.9% and the Western Conference champion Vegas Golden Knights sixth at 24.6%.<\/p>\n

Wiseman said the Sharks\u2019 power play must take another step.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at a lot of the successful penalty kills or power plays that are at the top of the league year after year, they\u2019ve been together for a couple, three years, four years,\u201d Wiseman said. \u201cSo we\u2019re trying to build that cohesiveness with this group, with our 10, 11, 12 guys that we have, so that we can take some significant strides.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chernyshov and Cagnoni are additions to the top unit. While Cagnoni did not have a point in three games with the Sharks at the end of last season, three of Chernyshov\u2019s nine goals in 27 NHL games last season came on the man advantage.<\/p>\n

Sunday, Chernyshov spent a little extra time after practice working on one-timers from near the hash marks, firing pucks off passes from development coach Mike Ricci.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis game is growing just from an individual standpoint, and so we want to give him a good look here,\u201d Wiseman said of Chernyshov. \u201cAt least today we did, and as we move forward, we\u2019ll see how it all plays out with the remainder of the guys and how the units look.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut he certainly did a good job for us last year as a young kid coming into this league.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stenberg is still getting used to the smaller North American-sized ice. But he has enough talent and experience playing against seasoned professionals in the Swedish Hockey League that the Sharks aren\u2019t worried about him taking a long time to adjust to the power play.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s done a heck of a job where he came from in Sweden in the men\u2019s league of scoring in those situations, specifically on the power play side, and so we\u2019re excited to add him to the group,\u201d Wiseman said. \u201cFor me, as a power play coach, those are the kinds of guys you love to work with. He\u2019s a highly intelligent player. He\u2019s a competitive player, and he\u2019s certainly highly skilled.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sharks\u2019 penalty-killing group included forward Collin Graf and Barclay Goodrow, and defensemen Darnell Nurse and Jacob Trouba. The Sharks\u2019 penalty kill finished in the NHL last season at 76.4%<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2013 Before the Sharks played the Anaheim Ducks in their first preseason game Sunday afternoon, most…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":899356,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,56492,3914,25924,575,7527,56494,356731,85],"class_list":["post-899355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-inside-sports","tag-latest-headlines","tag-macklin-celebrini","tag-nhl","tag-san-jose-sharks","tag-sharks-alert","tag-social-alert","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899355","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=899355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899355\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/899356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=899355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=899355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=899355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}