McDavid, Oilers impressed with Celebrini ahead of matchup with Sharks

EDMONTON -- Connor McDavid has enjoyed watching Macklin Celebrini put together an outstanding season, having once been in a similar situation.

The Edmonton Oilers center understands the expectations facing his San Jose Sharks counterpart all too well and marvels at how the 19-year-old is exceeding them in his second NHL season.

“He’s having a great year,” McDavid said. “He’s a young guy that is fun to watch, exciting to watch. Obviously, they’re a team that’s feeling pretty good about themselves, they have a good thing going, a good vibe about them. It’s pretty impressive to see that whole team come together.”

McDavid and Celebrini will face each other for the first time this season when the Sharks visit the Oilers on Thursday (9 p.m. ET; SN1, NBCSCA). The two will then be teammates for Team Canada at the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina in February.

“He seems to play a full, complete game,” McDavid said. “I think the biggest thing is, he battles hard, and you don’t see that every day in a 19- or 20-year-old. He’s obviously got a good grasp of this league right away and knows what it takes to be successful, and that’s a great thing at a young age.”

Celebrini, who is fourth in the NHL with 78 points (27 goals, 51 assists) in 51 games this season, had a goal and three assists in a 5-2 win at the Vancouver Canucks on Tuesday and has six points (three goals, three assists) in his past two games. He is a big reason San Jose (27-21-3), which is looking to qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs for the first time since 2018-19, is tied with the Los Angeles Kings and Seattle Kraken for the second wild card from the Western Conference, two points behind the Anaheim Ducks for third place in the Pacific Division.

After being selected No. 1 by the Sharks in the 2024 NHL Draft, he had 63 points (25 goals, 38 assists) in 70 games last season. Celebrini was a finalist for the Calder Trophy, awarded to the NHL rookie of the year, which was won by Montreal Canadiens defenseman Lane Hutson.

“He’s driven, it seems like. You could tell even last year playing against him, he plays hard,” McDavid said. “He plays not a typical teenager game. He’s dug in on face-offs, wins puck battles and does all the little things a veteran does. It’s been impressive.”

McDavid leads the NHL with 92 points (33 goals, 59 assists) in 54 games. Selected No. 1 by Edmonton in the 2015 NHL Draft, he had 100 points (30 goals, 70 assists) in 82 games in his second season in 2016-17, when he turned 20.

Celebrini entered the NHL under similar circumstances to both McDavid and Oilers forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. All three went No. 1 in the draft and were expected to take a young, rebuilding team to the next level.

“We’ve skated together a little bit (in the offseason) over the past few years,” Nugent-Hopkins said of him and Celebrini. “This year, I was unable to skate until later with my (broken) hand, but I’ve seen him and known about him for a long time now. The way he’s evolved into the player his is at this point, so fast, is very impressive.”

Nugent-Hopkins faced big expectations when he entered the League as an 18-year-old in 2011-12 after Edmonton selected him with the No. 1 pick in the 2011 NHL Draft. He had 52 points (18 goals, 34 assists) in 62 games in his first season.

A Vancouver-area product like Celebrini, Nugent-Hopkins played his 1,000 NHL game Sunday, becoming the first player to play that many exclusively with Edmonton. He knows firsthand how tough it is to have the type of impact Celebrini is making in his second season.

“It’s extremely difficult,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “There’s only really a handful of guys that have been able to step in and make the impact he has so far.

“I would say competing against bigger guys that you’re not used to every night is probably the hardest part. If you can think the game, it helps you, especially early on. Then you can kind of grow your game into that, but he obviously thinks the game so well, and is just hard on pucks and takes pucks into dirty areas, and he gets a lot of success off that.”

Prior to entering the NHL, Celebrini played for Canada at the 2024 World Junior Championship with current Oilers forward Matt Savoie. Celebrini was 17 at the time and had eight points (four goals, four assists) in five games for Canada, which was eliminated in the quarterfinals.

“He was our youngest player, but from Day 1, you could see the skill,” Savoie said. “I was pretty close to him. He was pretty close to the Western Canadian guys, which was pretty cool. We built a pretty good friendship and it was cool. It was cool to see him grow as a player.”

Celebrini had been touted to be a potential star player in the NHL for a number of seasons before entering the League. He was dominant as a 16-year-old with Chicago in the United States Hockey League, finishing with 86 points (46 goals, 40 assists) in 50 games in 2022-23, before playing one season with Boston University, where he had 64 points (32 goals, 32 assists) in 38 games.

“I think it just shows how special of a player he is to see what he was doing last year and how much better he’s gotten coming into this season,” Savoie said. “He’s definitely a guy that you have to be aware when he’s out there with the speed that he plays at. He’s got a big motor, he’s always moving, he’s deceptive. He uses a lot of fakes, so you always have to be on your toes when defending him.”