{"id":130962,"date":"2026-01-13T01:19:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T01:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/130962\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T01:19:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T01:19:10","slug":"macklin-celebrini-says-connor-mcdavid-nathan-mackinnon-are-best-in-nhl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/130962\/","title":{"rendered":"Macklin Celebrini says Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon are best in NHL"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2013 San Jose Sharks center Macklin Celebrini<\/a> doesn\u2019t really care if others feel he should be in the mix<\/a> for the Hart Memorial Trophy this season. He still believes Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon are the best players in the NHL.<\/a><\/p>\n

Celebrini entered Monday third in NHL scoring<\/a> with 70 points in 45 games, with both McDavid of the Edmonton Oilers and MacKinnon of the Colorado Avalanche tied for the league lead with 78 points each.<\/p>\n

But while both McDavid and MacKinnon have award-winning supporting casts,<\/a> namely center Leon Draisaitl with the Oilers and defenseman Cale Makar<\/a> with the Avalanche, Celebrini has more than twice as many points as the Sharks\u2019 second-highest scorer, Tyler Toffoli, who has 13 goals and 19 assists.<\/p>\n

Still, Celebrini puts McDavid and MacKinnon, his future Canadian Olympic teammates<\/a>, in a class by themselves. McDavid is a three-time Hart Trophy winner and led the NHL with 48 assists before Monday\u2019s games, and MacKinnon, with a league-high 36 goals this year, won the award after the 2023-24 season. The Avalanche has also been the NHL\u2019s best team<\/a> by a wide margin in 2025-26.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have two guys that are kind of duking it out and obviously having great years,\u201d Celebrini said Monday. \u201cColorado with their team, MacKinnon with his goal scoring and what he\u2019s done, and McDavid\u2019s McDavid.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it doesn\u2019t really matter if I\u2019m in the conversation or whatever people are talking about. I think those two are the best in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

During his 13-game point streak that ended in Sunday\u2019s 7-2 loss<\/a> to the Vegas Golden Knights, Celebrini led the Sharks with nine goals and 18 assists. In that time, McDavid had a league-leading 34 points in 15 games, and MacKinnon had 27 points in 14 games.<\/p>\n

The reason why Celebrini is in the Hart Trophy conversation is that the award, per the NHL, is presented annually \u201c<\/a>to the player adjudged to be the most valuable to his team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Entering this week, Celebrini has scored or assisted on 49.3% of the Sharks\u2019 goals this season and is the biggest reason why the team was in a playoff spot before Monday\u2019s games. San Jose, at 23-19-3 this season, had the league\u2019s worst record last season at 20-50-12.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have that many people talking about it, it\u2019s for a reason, so I think it\u2019s definitely well deserved,\u201d Sharks winger Jeff Skinner said of Hart Trophy chatter that surrounds Celebrini.<\/p>\n

\u201c(McDavid and MacKinnon) are dominant every night throughout a long season, and that\u2019s what Mack has been. He should be in the conversation. I don\u2019t know if there\u2019s anything else to say about it, really. He\u2019s had an unbelievable season so far, we\u2019re lucky to have him, and it\u2019s been fun to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n

Right now, Celebrini\u2019s more focused on what\u2019s directly ahead of him and the Sharks, and that\u2019s a daunting three-week stretch with nine of their next 10 games away from home.<\/p>\n

The Sharks begin a four-game road trip on Thursday against the Washington Capitals, who flattened San Jose 7-1 on Dec. 3 at SAP Center.<\/p>\n

Friday, the Sharks face the Detroit Red Wings, followed by games against the Florida Panthers next Monday and the Tampa Bay Lightning the following night. Detroit and Tampa Bay were the top two teams in the Atlantic Division before Monday\u2019s games, while Florida has a 14-9-3 record on home ice. Detroit and Tampa also both beat the Sharks earlier this season, with the Lightning walking away with a 7-3 win<\/a> in San Jose on Jan. 3<\/p>\n

After a Jan. 23 home game against the New York Rangers, the Sharks finish their pre-Olympic schedule with a five-game road trip that includes dates against McDavid and the Oilers, Connor Bedard and the Chicago Blackhawks, and MacKinnon and the Avalanche.<\/p>\n

In other words, the next 10 games could go a long way in determining whether the Sharks can make the playoffs for the first time since 2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis last part before break, we knew this stretch from December 27 to now is going to be a big part of our season,\u201d Celebrini said. \u201cWe have a great record. We got pumped against Tampa and then (Sunday) night, but other than that, we\u2019ve been playing some really good hockey, and we beat some really good teams.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be tough on the road, but we beat some pretty good teams on the road, like Carolina (on Dec. 7), so I think it is going to be really important to see kind of how our group stacks up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Celebrini is excited to see forwards Will Smith and Philipp Kurashev near a return to the active roster after spending the last four weeks on injured reserve. Smith practiced without restrictions on Monday, will fly with the team to Washington on Tuesday, and could return to the lineup later this week. Kurashev will not fly on Tuesday, but could join the Sharks on the second half of the trip, coach Ryan Warsofsky said.<\/p>\n

Before his upper body injury on Dec. 13, Smith had been on Celebrini\u2019s line for the majority of the season and was second on the team with 29 points in 33 games.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he\u2019s just happy he\u2019s almost back,\u201d Celebrini said of Smith. \u201cI think he\u2019s feeling pretty good and is obviously strong, so I think he\u2019s just excited to be on the ice again, skating with the guys, practicing with us. He\u2019ll be back soon.\u201d<\/p>\n

OTHER UPDATES<\/p>\n

Warsofsky said defensemen Vincent Desharnais and Shakir Mukhamadullin, both out with upper-body injuries, will most likely travel with the Sharks to Washington. Both practiced on Monday morning. The Sharks could soon face a roster crunch if Smith, Desharnais, and Mukhamadullin are healthy enough to come off IR, as they are already at 23 players. They could put center Ty Dellandrea on IR, but would have to create two other openings if they want to activate all three.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2013 San Jose Sharks center Macklin Celebrini doesn\u2019t really care if others feel he should be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130963,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[402,1533,181,1035,404,182,88,90,89,98,403,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-130962","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose","8":"tag-inside-sports","9":"tag-keywee","10":"tag-latest-headlines","11":"tag-macklin-celebrini","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-pm-report","14":"tag-san-jose","15":"tag-san-jose-headlines","16":"tag-san-jose-news","17":"tag-san-jose-sharks","18":"tag-sharks-alert","19":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130962"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130962\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130963"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}