{"id":920403,"date":"2026-10-04T15:06:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T15:06:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/920403\/"},"modified":"2026-10-04T15:06:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T15:06:12","slug":"sharks-exclusive-kesselring-talks-partnership-with-nurse-how-it-started-in-edmonton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/920403\/","title":{"rendered":"Sharks Exclusive: Kesselring Talks Partnership With Nurse: How It Started in Edmonton"},"content":{"rendered":"

When the San Jose Sharks traded for and extended Michael Kesselring<\/a>, they knew they were adding a valuable piece to the blue line.<\/p>\n

The fit made sense on the ice for the defenseman, but also for his d-partner. Since training camp began, the Sharks have paired Kesselring with Darnell Nurse<\/a>. The Edmonton Oilers<\/a> drafted both players, and although Kesselring never played a game in EDM, he skated with Nurse during some training camps. <\/p>\n

SHD spoke exclusively to Kesselring on Saturday about the history he\u2019s shared with his new partner.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s just a great guy. He says hi to everybody, all the rookies, all the younger guys, all the AHL guys,\u201d Kesselring said. \u201cHe was a big leader in that locker room, obviously. I kind of knew of him, and he introduced himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nurse also remembers his time with Kesselring in Edmonton. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s been a lot of fun to practice with, and I\u2019ve known Kes since he was young, just trying to break into the league,\u201d Nurse said on Sept. 24. \u201cHis length, speed, [and] ability to cover the ice. He plays the game hard. He\u2019s not easy to play against. So for me, you play the partner like that, it\u2019s a lot of fun. And it\u2019ll be a lot of fun to feed off of each and every shift, talk, communicate, and enjoy the game playing together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kesselring watched Nurse while in Edmonton, and his biggest takeaway was how hard Nurse worked. The Sharks defenseman viewed Nurse as a comparable player: a top-four defenseman who could skate and move the puck.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just remember me being a sixth-rounder, and I heard about how hard he worked. [He is] a similar player to me. Like a top-4 [d-man]. I want to be a top-4 d-man, [who can] play hard [and] be good both ways,\u201d Kesselring said. \u201cSo I always watched a lot of Edmonton games, and he was a guy I liked to watch. I kept up with him that way, and it is good to play with him now.\u201d<\/p>\n

In their first official San Jose Sharks game, Nurse and Kesselring delivered positive results, especially at even strength. Per Natural Stat Trick<\/a>, the duo played 12:50 at even strength against the Florida Panthers<\/a>. While on the ice, the Sharks outchanced their opponents 7-4, including two high-danger chances for and none against. <\/p>\n

Hockey Stat Cards on Twitter provided additional analytics on the rest of the team, showing that Nurse and Kesselring were the only two Sharks defensemen with a positive game score.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think every game we\u2019ve built off each other a little bit. I thought the other night was a pretty solid game from us,\u201d Kesselring said. \u201cIn preseason, it\u2019s tough. Like, we didn\u2019t play; we\u2019re practicing. The Anaheim game wasn\u2019t a great game. Then Vegas was a real game. I felt by the third [period] we were playing pretty well. And the other night I thought we were pretty solid. Just keep building on that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two will be paired again as the San Jose Sharks host the Los Angeles Kings<\/a> on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When the San Jose Sharks traded for and extended Michael Kesselring, they knew they were adding a valuable…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":920404,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,29972,23752,453,114531,764,316942],"class_list":["post-920403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-edmonton","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-darnell-nurse","tag-edmonton","tag-edmonton-oilers","tag-michael-kesselring","tag-san-jose-sharks","tag-sj-sharks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/920403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=920403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/920403\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/920404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=920403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=920403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=920403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}