Pavol Regenda has only played four games with the San Jose Sharks in the 2025-26 season, and he’s been a prolific goal-scorer in his short time at the NHL level, scoring five goals.
This includes his first-ever hat trick on Jan. 3 against the Tampa Bay Lightning.
“I have more goals now here than [with the] Barracuda,” Regenda quipped after the game. “Happy with this, I don’t even know what’s going on really, lately. I gotta thank God for it.”
The 6-foot-4 north-south winger has four goals and 12 points in 28 games with the San Jose Barracuda.
“I gotta stay hot,” Regenda joked, when recalled last week. “Probably the best soccer player in the [NHL] right now, [I scored my first two] goals with a foot, so hopefully it still stays this way. Golden foot.”
Regenda has worked his way up the San Jose Sharks’ line-up, going from the third line on New Year’s Eve to potentially the second line against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Tuesday.
I didn’t see defensive pairings, there were 7 d-men mixing in, Orlov, Liljegren, Ferraro, Iorio, Dickinson, Leddy & Desharnais
— Sheng Peng (@Sheng_Peng) January 4, 2026
“He’s a big guy, can get in there, win pucks,” San Jose Sharks head coach Ryan Warsofsky said, about the potential promotion.
Regenda, 26, is just taking it one day at a time. He’s played 23 NHL games over parts of three seasons with the Anaheim Ducks and Sharks, spending most of his pro North American hockey career in the AHL.
“I’m happy to get another chance and I’m gonna enjoy it,” he said.
With the San Jose Barracuda, Regenda had a front row seat for another Sharks teammate who’s currently seizing his NHL opportunity.
In just eight games with the San Jose Sharks since his mid-December recall, Igor Chernyshov has taken the best league in the world by storm, with three goals and five assists.
Regenda hasn’t been surprised by Chernyshov’s ascension.
“He was really good in every aspect, power play, penalty kill, five-on-five [in the AHL] so he deserved it and he got a chance,” Regenda said. “I feel like they’re happy with him and he looks really good out there. What he’s doing here, he was doing in Barracuda too, right? So I feel like I’m not surprised at all. He deserves pretty much everything he [gets]. I’m happy for him, he’s a young kid playing the dream.”
As Regenda looks forward, he’s awaiting news on potentially representing Slovakia in the Olympic Games for the second time. He played for his country during the 2022 Olympics and posted a goal and three assists in his seven games, helping lead Slovakia to their first-ever medal at the event, as they took home bronze.
“It was an unbelievable experience, but unfortunately, it was [during] COVID. So it [had] a quarantine. The village was closed, so we couldn’t even see the city,” Regenda recalled. “We came home as a heroes. That was big. We had a parade, [an] open bus. [It seemed like all of] Slovakia [came to] group up on the the main street.”
Slovakia is expected to name their roster on January 8, and Regenda should make it.
“I feel like it’s every year, if it’s Olympics [or the] World Championships, for those two or three weeks, all of Slovakia stops. Everybody is just into hockey,” Regenda said, joking, “We have many coaches off of the ice. Everybody thinks he’s the coach, but it’s funny. Slovakia stops and everybody loves hockey. We’re a big hockey country.”
