{"id":135094,"date":"2026-01-15T20:25:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-15T20:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/135094\/"},"modified":"2026-01-15T20:25:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-15T20:25:10","slug":"san-jose-sharks-will-smith-could-return-friday-face-detroit-red-wings-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/135094\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks’ Will Smith could return Friday, face Detroit Red Wings"},"content":{"rendered":"

Forward Will Smith could return to the active roster<\/a> as soon as Friday when the San Jose Sharks face the Detroit Red Wings on the second leg of a four-game road trip, coach Ryan Warsofsky told reporters Thursday morning<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Smith was a full participant in Wednesday\u2019s practice<\/a> in Washington, D.C., and took part in the team\u2019s morning skate on Thursday prior to its game against the Capitals to begin the road trip.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnother good day. Won\u2019t play today,\u201d Warsofsky said. \u201cHe\u2019ll get some work in this morning with our guys, and then we\u2019ll make a decision in the morning (about playing Friday).\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith sustained an upper-body injury in the Sharks\u2019 Dec. 13 game against the Pittsburgh Penguins. He has 29 points in 33 games this season and, before Thursday, was the Sharks\u2019 fourth-leading scorer despite missing the last 12 games. The Sharks are 7-5-0 in his absence.<\/p>\n

To activate Smith, who, along with forward Philipp Kurashev, has been on injured reserve since Dec. 15, the Sharks would have to clear a spot on their 23-man roster. Perhaps the simplest solution would be to put center Ty Dellandrea, who sustained a lower-body injury<\/a> on Jan. 6 in a game against the Columbus Blue Jackets, on IR.<\/p>\n

Dellandrea is considered week-to-week and will be reevaluated before the Olympic break in early February.<\/p>\n

The Sharks finish the challenging trip with games against the two-time defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers on Monday and the Atlantic Division-leading Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

NEDELJKOVIC STARTS<\/p>\n

Goalie Alex Nedeljkovic will start for the Sharks against the Capitals, perhaps setting up Yaroslav Askarov to start against the Red Wings on Friday.<\/p>\n

Nedeljkovic is 2-2-0 with an .867 save percentage in six career games against the Capitals, but is coming off a win over Dallas on Saturday when he made 16 saves in a 5-4 overtime victory over the Stars.<\/p>\n

This will be the 200th game, and 177th start, in Nedeljkovic\u2019s nine-year NHL career, in which he has an 81-68-29 record, a .902 save percentage, and a 3.01 goals against average. Nedeljkovic was a second-round draft pick of the Carolina Hurricanes in 2014 and was the third of 21 goalies selected that year.<\/p>\n

OVECHKIN\u2019S FINAL GAME VS. SHARKS?<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s game marks the final regular-season meeting between the Sharks and Capitals, and potentially Alex Ovechkin\u2019s last game against San Jose unless the two teams meet in the Stanley Cup Final in June.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin, the NHL\u2019s all-time leading goal scorer with 917 goals,<\/a> is in the final year of a five-year, $47.5 million contract and has not said whether he\u2019ll return in 2026-27 for a 22nd season. Although Ovechkin turned 40 in September, age hasn\u2019t slowed down his production, as he entered Thursday as the Capitals\u2019 second-leading scorer with 20 goals and 20 assists in 47 games. It\u2019s the 20th time in 21 seasons<\/a> that he\u2019s scored at least 20 goals.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin, before Thursday, had 32 points in 30 career games against the Sharks, the team he grew up cheering for<\/a> as a child in Moscow.<\/p>\n

In the Capitals\u2019 7-1 win over the Sharks in San Jose on Dec. 3, Ovechkin scored twice and had four shots on goal in 16:33 of ice time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Forward Will Smith could return to the active roster as soon as Friday when the San Jose Sharks…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":135046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[404,88,90,89,98,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-135094","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose","8":"tag-nhl","9":"tag-san-jose","10":"tag-san-jose-headlines","11":"tag-san-jose-news","12":"tag-san-jose-sharks","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135094","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=135094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}