The San Jose Sharks used to be a consistent Stanley Cup playoff threat. They didn’t quite get to the top of the mountain, but damned if they didn’t try, year in and year out.
But now, the Sharks are known for consistently being one of the worst teams in the NHL. They’ve failed to make the playoffs for the past six seasons, and they’re the only team that hasn’t won yet this year. Their record is a dismal 0-3-2.
All the losing is starting to get to San Jose coach Ryan Warsofsky.
“(Y)eah, trust me, it sucks,” Warsofsky said after the Sharks lost to the lowly Pittsburgh Penguins Saturday. “I keep telling myself there has to be a reason this keeps happening. I’d give up one of my children for a f—–g win.”
Warsofsky apologized for those comments on Monday.
“I love my kids. I would never give them up,” Warsofsky told reporters Monday. “I love my wife. Obviously, I’m a passionate, emotional person, and probably got ahead of me there, and so I apologize for those comments.”
The rhetoric aside, you can understand why he’s sounding so desperate to win. That said, he surely knew what he was getting into when he became coach of the Sharks in June 2024. This team was always going to require a lot of patience to run.
Although GM Mike Grier has openly been going about rebuilding the franchise in the most proven way to create a winner – by losing and acquiring elite talent through the draft – that doesn’t make it any easier when you’re the boots-on-the-ground coach that Warsofsky is, trying to fix this on-ice product and not succeeding daily.
Ultimately, San Jose’s struggles this year are a painful reminder the Sharks aren’t at the point of teams like the Anaheim Ducks and Montreal Canadiens that are clearly attempting to take that next competitive step and be a playoff team for the foreseeable future. The Sharks have that same goal, but they’re on a different timeline than the Ducks and Habs. And that’s likely at the root of Warsofsky’s frustrations.
If San Jose does finish at or near the bottom of the standings and lands the No. 1 pick in the 2026 draft, the Sharks would be in position to select NCAA phenom and foundational forward Gavin McKenna. That would probably lead to a different set of problems for San Jose – as in, how do you find meaningful roles for McKenna and current Sharks young forwards Macklin Celebrini, Will Smith, Michael Misa and William Eklund? But that’s a problem Grier would love to have. That would make these past six years and this season worth the pain.
Warsofsky still has to get this team to tread water until they get there, though.
Overtime losses to the Vegas Golden Knights and Ducks to begin the season were at least tight games where the Sharks had the lead at times. But their three games since then were a 5-1 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes6-3 loss to the Utah Mammoth and 3-0 loss to the Penguins. Those aren’t even close.
And so the Sharks have a league-worst five goals against and 35.8 shots against per game. Their offense isn’t much better, with a second-worst 23 shots-for per game and seventh-worst 2.60 goals-for per game.
Grier filled out his roster this summer with a slew of veterans on short-term contracts with little to no trade protection, such as Jeff Skinner, Adam Gaudette, Ryan Reaves, Nick Leddy and John Klingberg.
We heartily endorse what Grier has been doing with his roster, but that’s small comfort to the team right now. He’s smack in the middle of a process of change that will be shifting Sharks players around on the regular until further notice, so it’s understandable why the coaching staff or players will be frustrated occasionally.
Just about every other team has a better chance at making the playoffs this year than the Sharks. Their long-term future is bright, but their present prospects aren’t. So Warsofsky’s primary job is to keep his players’ heads in the air as the ship takes on water around them. San Jose’s rebuild was fun last year with Celebrini and Smith’s rookie seasons, but the bleak current reality of Grier’s building job has put some serious grey clouds among the Sharks’ silver linings.
Thus, it’s not going to be fun if and when San Jose sinks to the very bottom of the standings. They’re already basically there, and the season is only a couple of weeks old. The worst may be yet to come for the Sharks, and Warsofsky’s heightened stress levels may only be beginning.
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