Macklin Celebrini represented the San Jose Sharks well at the Olympics — and a new worldwide audience watched his exploits.
Celebrini scored the most goals of any player in the men’s hockey tournament. He was no mere bit player. Team Canada coach Jon Cooper often included him in freakishly skilled trio with Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon. Now, Celebrini comes back to a Sharks club that was running on a flat tire heading into a sorely needed Olympic break after four consecutive losses. And Celebrini, who’s often carried San Jose in this unexpected season, could only do so much to fend off those defeats.
Celebrini figures to be renewed by his first Olympic experience, but he’ll rejoin a team that’s now slipped five points out of a playoff spot. It isn’t an insurmountable margin to recover from, especially with games in hand, but that stretch could send the team in a particular direction when it comes to the important March 6 trade deadline.
There are just four games ahead of that deadline once the Sharks resume play on Thursday. General manager Mike Grier may have already drawn up his course, but after years of being a clear seller, there are different avenues he could head down.
Option No. 1: Continue to target buy
With a strong season as a pending unrestricted free agent on a struggling Vancouver Canucks team, Kiefer Sherwood was a popular name on the market. The conditions were ripe. He was having a career season at age 30 with a minuscule $1.5 million salary-cap hit.
The surprise was that the Sharks grabbed the winger for second-round picks in 2026 and 2027, along with minor-league defenseman Cole Clayton. Sherwood made his San Jose debut on Feb. 4 in Colorado, playing more than 17 minutes and registering four hits along with a shot on goal.
Grier sacrificed some of his available assets for a player who isn’t committed to them beyond this season. They do still have Colorado’s 2026 second-round pick, obtained in the Mackenzie Blackwood trade, but they are without their 2027 second-rounder, along with third-round picks for the next three years. The draft-pick haul they once possessed isn’t as plentiful now, but trading for Sherwood was more about sending a rewarding message to an improving team.
Could the Sharks move further down that path? Possibly. There were reports of interest in Artemi Panarin, and while parting with 20-year-old scorer Will Smith was a non-starter, that’s another sign of a shift into the buyer’s market. The Sharks have long needed to upgrade on defense, but the preference should be toward finding longer-term solutions than the current stopgaps.
The Sharks only have veteran Dmitry Orlov and rookie Sam Dickinson signed beyond this season. Both help fill the left side of the defense, along with youngster Shakir Mukhamadullin and current longtime backbone Mario Ferraro. The right side, though, is suspect and that’s why they attempted to trade for Dougie Hamilton last summer. But with Hamilton seemingly on the outs in New Jersey, could the 32-year-old be more open to the Sharks? He has two more years remaining with a $9 million cap hit.
Hamilton would be the best puck-mover. A better fit for their timeline would be 24-year-old New York Rangers righty Braden Schneider, who is more of a minutes-chomping shutdown option. He would come at a higher cost, as a pending restricted free agent still under some control by the Rangers. Calgary acquired Zach Whitecloud, 29, from Vegas in the Rasmus Andersson trade, but the rebuilding Flames could move him along again. Whitecloud still has term, as does St. Louis’s Justin Faulk and Toronto’s Brandon Carlo. As pending UFAs, Chicago’s Connor Murphy and Boston’s Andrew Peeke could hold lower-cost appeal.
The Sharks are also still rich in quality prospect depth. What Grier can’t get caught up in is putting one of his two 2026 first-round picks, or his 2027 first, in play for a defenseman who wouldn’t be a core piece for the long term.
Option No. 2: Do some buying, some selling
The days of moving a high-value asset such as Mikael Granlund should be over. It was a little more than a year ago that Grier traded his leading scorer, along with right-shot veteran blueliner Cody Ceci. Both were about to hit UFA status, and the Sharks were heading toward another last-place finish.
Things are different now.
San Jose is loaded with UFA-bound players. Five are on defense alone. Grier could choose to navigate the deadline by parting with some periphery pieces — or even one or two that the Sharks rely on a great deal — but not dramatically subtracting from a group that played its way into playoff contention after a horrid start to the 2025-26 season.
The Sharks could look to add a player of note (perhaps one of above mentioned) while attempting to recoup some lost assets and keep them in storage for possible offseason moves. The one problem is, they don’t have a lot of productive players to shop that won’t be needed for a playoff push — assuming that remains the goal for the final 27 games.
Jeff Skinner is not a candidate because his contract was terminated during the break. Defenseman Timothy Liljegren doesn’t have a ton of value on his own outside of being a righty, but the 26-year-old could be included with a good prospect/pick for an upgrade on the right side. Veteran John Klingberg has been moved at the deadline before, but unless he’s looking to join a Stanley Cup contender in a depth role, Klingberg might not be easy to part with because he’s the Sharks’ only pure offensive threat from the back end.
Alex Nedeljkovic might have the best resume among the expendables, because he has outplayed Yaroslav Askarov in goal but the Sharks remain committed to Askarov as the long-term No. 1 option. San Jose used a 2028 third-round pick to get Nedeljkovic, but it acquired Laurent Brossoit on Jan. 8. The oft-injured Brossoit, 32, is getting his game back together in the AHL but he’s been an excellent NHL backup at times and has playoff experience. If Nedeljkovic draws interest, Brossoit gives them strong insurance.
Option No. 3: Undergo a larger sell
What if the Sharks’ slide continues and their push for the postseason stalls out completely? Is the proper move to load back up on assets and start building for 2026-27 and beyond?
The first thing they could do is deal Sherwood, particularly if it is apparent that he’d rather take his chances at a bigger payday in free agency. The Sharks may not get back as much as they paid, but physical wingers who can skate are always in demand.
A larger, and tougher, consideration is Ferraro, whose name has been in trade rumors for a while. The 27-year-old defender has ridden out the Sharks’ tough times of late and often has been tasked with playing roles above his capability. He has had a solid rebound season and wants to continue experiencing the franchise’s rebirth. The Sharks would like to keep the career-long association going, but appear wary of the length Ferraro is seeking in an extension.
The development plan for Dickinson could be a factor here. The Sharks have been careful not to burden the 19-year-old with a lot of game-changing situational play, scratching him at times early on and mostly limiting his usage to third-pairing work at five-on-five. But it is interesting that they’ve given him more defensive-zone starts than in the offensive end. His ice time overall has fluctuated but is increasing on average since the start of 2026.
If the Sharks feel Dickinson is ready to handle more responsibility the rest of the way — and that could be said of Mukhamadullin as well — they could explore what Ferraro might bring back in a trade return. They’ve already moved Nick Leddy off a crowded blue line, through waivers. They’ve got other pending UFAs in Klingberg, Liljegren and Vincent Desharnais (though Desharnais should be worth considering for an extension as a solid No. 6/7 to have handy).
It’s not a bad thing to have more assets available to create a package in a larger deal. The Sharks could target an impact player in his mid-20s who still has plenty of prime years ahead, though those do not come on the market often.
Option No. 4: Do nothing
Being in competition for a playoff spot this deep into the schedule was a realistic goal for next season. The Sharks are a year ahead, which allows Celebrini and co. to play meaningful games without the outside expectations of winning a lot. They’re operating with house money and only an end-of-season collapse would bring some measure of disappointment.
The Sharks could ride out the deadline, keeping a bonded group intact. They wouldn’t have to deal with subtracting from the dressing room. It’s very possible they will fall short of the postseason and wind up in the draft lottery again, but even the prospect of their first-round pick being in the teens instead of single digits wouldn’t hurt the positive vibes created. And a rising salary cap relieves any pressure to dump cumbersome contracts.
Cap space will only increase with Skinner off their books, and the Sharks could have acres of it for 2026-27 (CapWages currently estimates more than $54 million) even with the dead money from retaining salary in the Erik Karlsson and Tomáš Hertl trades and buying out Marc-Édouard Vlasic and Martin Jones. They’ll eventually have to address signing Celebrini and Smith to what could be huge second contracts, but they’re still in great position to attract a major free agent.
The problem is, teams have been proactive in locking up their stars. As it stands now, the best forwards who could enter the UFA market are Alex Tuch and Nick Schmaltz. More intriguing are possible big-name RFAs such as Jason Robertson and Pavel Dorofeyev, if those goal-scoring wingers price themselves out of their current clubs and are open to signing long extensions.
As far as the defense, Andersson sought Vegas as a trade destination and the Golden Knights regularly find ways to retain their major acquisitions. But there are right-shot UFAs to consider if they hit the market. At 29, Darren Raddysh is having a monster breakout season for Tampa Bay. His booming shot from the point would fit nicely on the Sharks, but there is a risk that a huge 2025-26 is an anomaly for a blueliner who toiled for years in the AHL.
There are often veterans such as Murphy, or even Jacob Trouba if he doesn’t re-sign with Anaheim. It would be hard to see an aging John Carlson switch coasts after a career spent with Washington, or even a battle-hardened Radko Gudas fitting in with San Jose’s current timeline. But after trading for Sherwood, Grier could wait and do some heavier lifting in the offseason to help the Sharks take their next step forward.