Sharks’ Macklin Celebrini out against Stars with lower-body injury

The San Jose Sharks announced Monday that they ruled captain Macklin Celebrini out of their game against the Dallas Stars that day due to a lower-body injury.

Celebrini, 20, recorded five assists through his first two games of the 2026-27 regular season. He warmed up in his usual spot on the Sharks’ top line prior to Monday’s game in Dallas but was ruled out shortly before opening puck drop.

Named team captain during the Sharks’ 2026 training camp, Celebrini led his team to back-to-back overtime wins against the Florida Panthers and Los Angeles Kings in the first week of the new season. With Celebrini ruled out, the Sharks dressed Ty Dellandrea as their 12th forward and promoted Alexander Wennberg to their first line against the Stars.

A star forward in every sense of the word, Celebrini has been the Sharks’ leader on and off the ice since being drafted first overall in 2024. The North Vancouver product has collected 70 goals and 183 points in 154 games over parts of three seasons in San Jose.

Celebrini is coming off a 2025-26 campaign in which he posted some of the strongest numbers by any teenager in recent memory, racking up 45 goals and 115 points in 82 games. Along the way, he was named to Team Canada for the 2026 Winter Olympics, scoring five goals and 10 points in six games in Milan.

Now in the final season of his three-year, entry-level contract, Celebrini is set to enjoy an enormous jump in pay starting in the 2027-28 season, having signed a five-year, $18.8 million AAV extension with the Sharks on July 29. He’s the centerpiece of a loaded group of young Sharks forwards that also includes Ivar Stenberg, Igor Chernyshov, Will Smith, Michael Misa, and Collin Graf.

Off a goal by Miro Heiskanen late in the first period, the Stars led the Sharks by a 1-0 score after 20 minutes of play at American Airlines Center in Dallas.