This was like the SAP Center of yore.
Will Smith could feel the buzz even before the game, the San Jose Sharks’ first appearance at home in almost two weeks, sellout crowd.
“In warm-ups, I was like, this place is bumping,” Smith said, after the Sharks’ 3-1 victory over the New York Rangers. “I knew it was gonna be a big night, especially with an Original Six team here. We definitely felt the energy.”
The San Jose Sharks carried that energy over to drop of the puck, racing out to a 2-0 lead just 3:08 in. His squad overwhelmed, Rangers head coach Mike Sullivan called a timeout.
Four minutes later, Macklin Celebrini blasted his second goal of the night.
Three goals scored, the crowd’s impulse wasn’t to cheer for tacos — Taco Bell has been giving away free tacos for years when the Sharks reach three goals at home — instead, they serenaded Celebrini with “MVP” chants.
It was a small moment, but meaningful. San Jose has been so bad for long at SAP Center — from 2022-23 to 2024-25, the Sharks won an NHL-worst 31 home games, 14 less than second-worst Chicago Blackhawks and Anaheim Ducks — what else was there to cheer for but free food?
Celebrini and San Jose, however, have changed the narrative. The 26-21-3 Sharks hold the final wild card berth in the Western Conference. They’re 14-9-3 at home.
“The energy and how loud they were,” Celebrini said, “you definitely felt it.”
“The word around the league was you had to get through the first period,” ex-San Jose Sharks head coach Peter DeBoer said in Apr. 2024, hearkening back to the days when SAP Center was always a sellout. “The building was rocking, the crowd was into it, that team could overwhelm you.”
“I’ve never witnessed that live, but everyone talks about it in the National Hockey League. I think tonight was probably the first time I felt that, and we felt that as a group,” current head coach Ryan Warsofsky said. “We want to keep it going.”
Macklin Celebrini
Will Smith
Pavol Regenda
Regenda admitted that even he was surprised by his backhand on his goal: “Sometimes it’s better when you just close your eyes and put it there…we had a couple of drills yesterday. I felt pretty good, so I was like, okay, I’ll go try [that] and it worked out.”
— Sheng Peng (@Sheng_Peng) January 24, 2026
Ryan Warsofsky
