The San Jose Sharks have announced their 2025-26 Awards.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s how I voted!<\/p>\n
Player of the Year<\/p>\n
Winner: Macklin Celebrini<\/p>\n
My vote (in order): Macklin Celebrini, Alex Wennberg, Dmitry Orlov<\/p>\n
If I could\u2019ve voted Macklin, Macklin, Macklin, I would\u2019ve, that\u2019s how good a year that he had, no disrespect to the rest of the San Jose Sharks.<\/p>\n
That said, Wennberg enjoyed a solid offensive season and is one of the best defensive centers in the league. He\u2019s the only other Sharks forward, besides Celebrini, to average over 20 minutes a night.<\/p>\n
Orlov had some high-profile mistakes at the end of the season, but overall, he was still San Jose\u2019s best all-around defenseman, moving the puck and killing plays with regularity. He was an upgrade on other Sharks\u2019 placeholder No. 1 defensemen of years past, blueliners like Mario Ferraro and Jake Walman.<\/p>\n
I will say, Ferraro, with a slightly lighter load, had one of his better seasons in teal. He was definitely in the running for the No. 3 spot on my vote.<\/p>\n
Media Good Guy<\/p>\n
Winner: Mario Ferraro<\/p>\n
My vote (in order): Alex Nedeljkovic, Ferraro, Wennberg<\/p>\n
I usually vote for the guys with the most media responsibilities, a la leadership who have to come out and answer our questions after a tough loss.<\/p>\n
Ferraro is a well-deserving three-time winner, but Nedeljkovic was also impressive post-game, answering tough questions of all sorts with candor and accountability. No doubt, he\u2019s a part of leadership too, and no one bears more of the brunt of a loss than a goalie, more often than not.<\/p>\n
The Sharks asked me to say something about Ferraro:<\/p>\n
Celebrini also deserves an honorable mention here, too, and perhaps should\u2019ve come in ahead of fellow alternate captain Wennberg. The media load for Celebrini was unlike anything I\u2019ve ever seen for a Shark, especially after his season started taking off in November and the Olympics became talk, then reality. While not as expansive as the other three players that I voted for, he was always accountable, and incredibly patient, all things considered, with repetitive question after repetitive question. In retrospect, he probably deserved the No. 3 spot at least here, no disrespect to the always-steady Wennberg.<\/p>\n
Rookie of the Year<\/p>\n
Winner: Yaroslav Askarov<\/p>\n
My vote (in order): Askarov, Sam Dickinson<\/p>\n
The eligible rookies were Askarov, Ethan Cardwell, Igor Chernyshov, Dickinson, Patrick Giles, Michael Misa, and Pavol Regenda.<\/p>\n
Chernyshov and Regenda were more impressive, in short flashes, than Askarov and Dickinson, but both Askarov and Dickinson were here for the entire season.<\/p>\n
It was an up-and-down campaign for both the goalie and the defenseman, but I give the edge to the No. 1 netminder over the essentially No. 6 blueliner (in terms of ice-time). Askarov also had one dominating month, an 8-2-2 November with a .940 Save %. Dickinson never reached those kind of heights this year.<\/p>\n
Prospect of the Year<\/p>\n
Winner: Eric Pohlkamp<\/p>\n
The media doesn\u2019t vote on this, team hockey operations does. It\u2019s not an award for best prospect, it\u2019s a vote for which prospect had the best season in his league.<\/p>\n
And which San Jose Sharks prospect has a better season than NCAA champion and Hobey Baker Hat Trick finalist Pohlkamp?<\/p>\n
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