San Jose Sharks unable to slow down Utah Mammoth in preseason finale

The San Jose Sharks finished up the preseason schedule on Saturday night against the Utah Mammoth in Salt Lake City and for the first period it looked like they really didn t want to be there The Sharks allowed four goals on seven shots in the first period and trailed by three before Tyler Toffoli Barclay Goodrow and Will Smith all scored in the second period with Smith s power play goal tying the competition at the mark The Sharks though could not slow down the Mammoth in the third period allowing goals to Clayton Keller and Brandon Tanev in a - loss at the Delta Center The Sharks were outshot - in the third period and starting goalie Yaroslav Askarov stopped of shots The Sharks dressed mostly an NHL-caliber lineup in their final tune-up before the start of the regular season on Thursday at home against the Vegas Golden Knights Saturday s lineup included center Macklin Celebrini who made his preseason debut after he was unable to play in the Sharks first five exhibition games as he recovered from an undisclosed ailment that he sustained at the start of training camp I demanded to be with the gang the whole time and for whatever reason it got taken off subject Celebrini noted Saturday morning in San Jose But now I m back and excited to play Celebrini who led the Sharks with points in games last season started Saturday s event on a line with Will Smith and Philipp Kurashev Celebrini and Smith were on the same line for several games last year and lined up with Kurashev during a latest practice The Sharks signed the versatile Kurashev to a one-year million contract on July after he had points in games over five seasons with the Chicago Blackhawks Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky commented he was going to monitor Celebrini s ice time as he played his first tournament since May when he was with Association Canada at the IIHF World Championship in Europe Up until Wednesday of this week Celebrini had been held out of contact drills Celebrini had three hits and won seven of faceoffs in of ice time We have a pretty good plan of where we want him to finish at and we ll see Warsofsky disclosed He s going to be champing at the bit to perhaps play minutes but that will not happen The Sharks must reduce their roster to players by Monday at p m PT and one of the bigger questions general manager Mike Grier and the Sharks have is whether to keep Michael Misa and fellow top prospect defenseman Sam Dickinson for at least the first part of the NHL season If they do more players will likely need to go on waivers with forwards Pavol Regenda Egor Afanasyev and Carl Grundstrom as well as defenseman Jack Thompson being among the possibilities NHL teams have hours to claim anyone placed on waivers If that athlete is not claimed they can be assigned to the club s AHL affiliate For the start of the season if multiple teams submit a waiver claim for a participant the gang that finished lower in the NHL standings the previous season wins the claim We ll play it out Warsofsky revealed We ve still got a couple more days here to make these decisions Grier and I have talked in depth about a lot of our guys and where we see the roster shaping up and we ll continue to work on it You never want to lose players but that is the nature of the business