{"id":269792,"date":"2026-04-15T23:13:22","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T23:13:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/269792\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T23:13:22","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T23:13:22","slug":"san-jose-sharks-john-klingberg-to-hit-milestone-nhl-draft-lottery-odds-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/269792\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks’ John Klingberg to hit milestone; NHL Draft Lottery odds"},"content":{"rendered":"

San Jose Sharks defenseman John Klingberg, a healthy scratch for several games in recent weeks, will at least get a chance to reach a career milestone<\/a> to finish the regular season.<\/p>\n

Coach Ryan Warsofsky said Wednesday<\/a> that Klingberg will play in his 700th career NHL game<\/a> on Thursday night when the Sharks face the Winnipeg Jets at Canada Life Center in their final regular-season outing of 2025-26.<\/p>\n

The game could be Klingberg\u2019s final one in a Sharks uniform after the team was eliminated from playoff contention<\/a> on Monday. Klingberg is on a one-year contract<\/a> with the Sharks and is a pending unrestricted free agent.<\/p>\n

Klingberg will not play in the Sharks\u2019 game against the Chicago Blackhawks<\/a> on Wednesday night at the United Center, marking the eighth time in the last nine games that he\u2019s been a healthy scratch in a season that did not go as smoothly as anyone hoped.<\/p>\n

Klingberg is the Sharks\u2019 second-leading scorer among defensemen<\/a> with 24 points in 55 games and is tied for fourth among all skaters with an average of 20:28 in ice time per game.<\/p>\n

But he missed time in October and January with injuries, and some inconsistent play led to a handful of healthy scratches through the Sharks\u2019 first 67 games.<\/p>\n

Still, the 56 games Klingberg will have played in this season represent the most he\u2019s had in any year since 2022-23, when he played in a combined 67 games with the Anaheim Ducks and Minnesota Wild.<\/p>\n

Klingberg needed double-hip resurfacing surgery in Dec. 2023 and was only able to return to the NHL in Jan. 2025 when he signed a one-year contract with the Edmonton Oilers.<\/p>\n

Klingberg was a fifth-round pick by the Dallas Stars and in 699 games with six teams, has 92 goals and 348 assists. In 367 games from the start of the 2014-15 season to the end of 2018-19, Klingberg was the NHL\u2019s seventh-highest scoring defenseman<\/a> with 259 points.<\/p>\n

From his 2010 draft class,<\/a> Klingberg is the 26th player to reach 700 games. He also ranks 21st with 440 points.<\/p>\n

The Sharks are keeping the same lineup as they had in their 3-2 win over the Nashville Predators.<\/p>\n

DRAFT LOTTERY TALK<\/p>\n

The Sharks were 23rd in the NHL\u2019s overall standings before Wednesday and could climb as high as 21st if they win their last two games and finish with 88 points.<\/p>\n

The Sharks could also fall as far as 26th if they lose their final two games in regulation time and the St. Louis Blues and Florida Panthers both close the regular season with wins. The Sharks and Jets would each have 84 points, and Winnipeg would hold the tiebreaker with more regulation-time victories.<\/p>\n

If the Sharks finish 21st in the NHL standings, they will not have a chance at picking first overall if they win the draft lottery.<\/a> The highest any team can move up in the draft order <\/a>if they win the lottery is 10 spots, meaning the Sharks would only be eligible for the second overall selection.<\/p>\n

If they stay in 23rd place, the Sharks would have a 3.5% chance of winning the lottery on May 5.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks defenseman John Klingberg, a healthy scratch for several games in recent weeks, will at least…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":269793,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[2068,1034,106082,88,90,89,98,1707],"class_list":{"0":"post-269792","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose","8":"tag-chicago-blackhawks","9":"tag-john-klingberg","10":"tag-nhl-draft-lottery","11":"tag-san-jose","12":"tag-san-jose-headlines","13":"tag-san-jose-news","14":"tag-san-jose-sharks","15":"tag-winnipeg-jets"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269792","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=269792"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269792\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}