The San Jose Sharks believe.

That much is clear, after the Sharks’ impressive 5-4 OT comeback victory over the Dallas Stars on Saturday afternoon.

It wasn’t just that San Jose rallied from a pair of two-goal deficits, 2-0 and 4-2, against a true Stanley Cup contender.

It’s how they did it, playing a consistent, relentless style, even when faced with adversity.

“We definitely stuck with it,” alternate captain Tyler Toffoli said.

“It’s what good teams do,” Adam Gaudette noted.

It’s what playoff teams do.

The 23-18-3 San Jose Sharks are five games over .500 for the first time since the 2018-19 season.

That’s also the last time that the Sharks were in the playoffs.

San Jose is third in the Pacific Division through 44 games, a frankly unbelievable development, after consecutive seasons as the worst team in the NHL.

But like I said, the Sharks believe.

“We like playing good teams, and we like beating the good teams,” Gaudette said. “Because we’re a good team.”

When alternate captain Mario Ferraro first said the “P” word on Nov. 8, after the San Jose Sharks’ 3-1 victory over the Florida Panthers, it felt like just a whisper within the organization. At the time, San Jose was 7-6-3, just recovering from a here-we-go-again 0-4-2 start.

A week later, after an ugly loss at the Calgary Flames, San Jose Sharks head coach Ryan Warsofsky, rightly, went out of his way to keep his team grounded. It was, after all, early in the season.

“Where we’re at as a team is, no offense, but reading all this stuff about playoffs and where we are,” he said on Nov. 14, “we got a long way to go here.”

It feels like the Sharks have come a long way, especially since that mid-December road trip that closed with comeback wins at the Toronto Maple Leafs and Pittsburgh Penguins. They’re 9-4-0 since Dec. 11 at Toronto, and spearheaded by Macklin Celebrini’s ascension to NHL superstardom, they’ve been playing, save a couple ugly losses, some of their most consistent hockey of the season.

And they’re playing, especially on Saturday against the Stars, playoff-caliber hockey.

“We’re maturing,” Gaudette said, “and we’re playing mature hockey.”

For weeks, Sharks players, from Celebrini to Collin Graf to Ryan Reaves, have been tossing the “P” word freely.

“There’s a big belief in that dressing room right now,” Warsofsky said.

For the first time in a long time, playoffs aren’t a bad word in San Jose.

Ryan Warsofsky

Warsofsky, on the San Jose Sharks’ resiliency:

The guys did a good job of just competing and playing and playing through things. They scored to make it 4-2. It could have easily went away. And credit to the group for digging in and finding a way.

Warsofsky, on how impressive this comeback was:

We’re a good hockey team.

Sam Dickinson

Dickinson, on his buzzcut:

I think Delly led the charge first, and then Goody came in and his was gone. And I was like, well, I’ll be next. 2026, Year of the Buzzcut. So we’ll see which one of you guys jump in on that.

Adam Gaudette

Gaudette, on how the San Jose Sharks keep going, despite being down:

Just stick with it. We do the right things, we’re going to get rewarded for it.

When things don’t go our way, you can’t get too low. And when things are going our way, you can’t get too high, because it can change just like that.

Gaudette: “We like playing good teams, and we like beating the good teams. Because we’re a good team.”

— Sheng Peng (@Sheng_Peng) January 11, 2026

Gaudette, on how the team has matured this season:

We’re not getting down. We don’t get down. We’re not motherfucking each other out there. We come together as a group. We get down, we grab the guy next to us, and we just go right back to work. It’s what good teams do.

Tyler Toffoli

Toffoli, on the San Jose Sharks’ comeback:

We definitely stuck with it. And obviously we had a lot of power plays, but I thought we earned all of them and did a really good job of using our speed, holding on to pucks.