{"id":263863,"date":"2026-04-12T10:58:33","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T10:58:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/263863\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T10:58:33","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T10:58:33","slug":"san-jose-sharks-veteran-mario-ferraro-not-yet-focusing-on-long-term-future-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/263863\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks veteran Mario Ferraro not yet focusing on long-term future"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2013 Veteran defenseman Mario Ferraro has approached each of the nearly 500 games<\/a> he\u2019s played with the San Jose Sharks over the last seven seasons<\/a> the same way.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhich is with high energy,\u201d Ferraro said Saturday before the Sharks hosted the Vancouver Canucks,<\/a> \u201cand not taking any game for granted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, though, there was a chance Saturday\u2019s game could be Ferraro\u2019s final one at SAP Center<\/a> in a Sharks uniform.<\/p>\n

The 27-year-old Ferraro, San Jose\u2019s longest-tenured player,<\/a> remains a pending unrestricted free agent, and after Saturday, the Sharks finish the regular season on a three-game road trip, with no guarantee<\/a> they\u2019ll be able to play another game at home this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, those things could come into mind,\u201d Ferraro said when asked about his emotions going into what could be his final home game at the Shark Tank. \u201cBut for me, it\u2019s the same mentality as I have every night. Some nights, the result is better than others, but it\u2019s about the process.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m hoping to get the result (Saturday), of course. But the same mentality is to give my all and help this team win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following their 6-1 loss<\/a> to the Anaheim Ducks on Thursday, their third loss in four games, the Sharks\u2019 playoff chances had dwindled to nearly nothing. With 81 points, the Sharks were in 11th place<\/a> in the Western Conference and trailed the Los Angeles Kings for the second wild card spot by six points with four games to play.<\/p>\n

Changes figure to be coming as the Sharks only have two defensemen on their NHL roster signed for next season.<\/a> The Sharks, before Saturday, were also 31st in the NHL in goals allowed per game (3.58),<\/a> only a slight improvement from the 3.78 they allowed last season as the league\u2019s last-place team.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not all on the defense corps, of course, but the Sharks have expectations of making the playoffs next season and have the opportunity this summer to make some significant changes to the back end.<\/p>\n

Including Saturday, Ferraro has played in 487 games with the Sharks, and this season, he is third on the team with an average of 21 minutes of ice time per game. He had 21 points in 78 games before Saturday, was third in the NHL in total shorthanded time on ice (262:03), and 22nd in blocked shots (142).<\/p>\n

Sharks general manager Mike Grier said last month<\/a> that teams inquired about Ferraro before the trade deadline. But Grier made the decision to keep the team\u2019s longest-tenured player and alternate captain, and added that he was open to bringing some of his pending UFAs back next season.<\/p>\n

That list includes forwards Ryan Reaves and Pavol Regenda, and defensemen Nick Leddy, John Klingberg, and Vincent Desharnais. Ferraro, a second-round pick by the Sharks in 2017,\u00a0 is in the final year of a four-year, $13 million<\/a> contract.<\/p>\n

Ferraro said he wants to stay in San Jose, but added, \u201cI\u2019m not going to go into all of that kind of stuff now. It\u2019s out of my control,\u201d Ferraro said of his contract status. \u201cWe\u2019ve got four games here left. I\u2019m just trying to play as hard as I can to give us a chance.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoor\u2019s still open for the playoffs here, I\u2019ve still got a job to do. But that kind of stuff is extremely out of my control now. I\u2019m just focused on what I can do, (which) is to play the best hockey that I can in these last four games.\u201d<\/p>\n

FAN APPRECIATION DAY AND NIGHT<\/p>\n

The Sharks were expecting their 22nd sellout crowd of the season for Saturday\u2019s Fan Appreciation game. The Sharks had 15 sellouts last season, and only 11 in 2023-24.<\/p>\n

The Sharks have even seen bigger crowds for their practices and morning skates at Sharks Ice. Saturday, for what could have been the team\u2019s final morning skate in San Jose, seats were at a premium, with a long line for autographs near the rink\u2019s entrance.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can tell our fans are extremely loyal, and they care, and they\u2019re excited about what has happened this year, but probably the future as well,\u201d Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said. \u201cEven a Tuesday practice, there are a lot of people out there watching.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur fans are extremely loyal and patient; those are the two words I would use.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sharks, before Saturday, had a home record this season of 21-14-5, their best since going 25-11-5 in 2018-19. The Sharks went 12-27-2 at home last year.<\/p>\n

LINEUP CHANGES<\/p>\n

The Sharks inserted rookie forward Igor Chernyshov back into the lineup Saturday after he was a healthy scratch Thursday. He replaced Pavol Regenda, who joined fellow forwards Philipp Kurashev and Ty Dellandrea, and defenseman John Klingberg, as scratches for Saturday.<\/p>\n

The Sharks, in a must-win game, also started goalie Yaroslav Askarov instead of Alex Nedeljkovic on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Nedeljkovic has had better numbers since the Olympic break, going 6-5-2 with an .881 save percentage in 13 games, compared to Askarov (4-4-1, .867 save percentage), but the Sharks want Askarov to develop into their No. 1 goalie.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd when you\u2019re the number one goalie,\u201d Warsofsky said, \u201cyou get these games.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2013 Veteran defenseman Mario Ferraro has approached each of the nearly 500 games he\u2019s played with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":263864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[4217,9899,94231,88,90,89,98,20226],"class_list":{"0":"post-263863","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose","8":"tag-mario-ferraro","9":"tag-nhl-free-agency","10":"tag-pending-ufa","11":"tag-san-jose","12":"tag-san-jose-headlines","13":"tag-san-jose-news","14":"tag-san-jose-sharks","15":"tag-vancouver-canucks"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263863","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=263863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}