The Sharks just got a CRUCIAL update...

The Sharks just got a crucial update on the status of Macklin Celebrini and his injury updates. In this video we're going to break it down, talk about what his status is heading into tonight's game. We're going to actually tee up tonight's game as well. Talk about some big things that we're looking out for heading into St. Louis tonight. So if you don't want to miss this episode of Sharks Digest, we're boydiving everything here. Just want to say we'll be back with another watch-along stream tonight. So love to see all you guys there on the channel, you can go to the live tab, hit notify me or hit the subscribe, put the notifications on and you will be notified when we go live for that watch-along tonight. I really hope to see all you guys there, but yes, let's get right into it because obviously Macklin Celebrini not playing against the Dallas Stars the other night was a big storyline and we've kind of been waiting for an update on this situation and Chris Johnston, a reporter, you know, kind of got everybody scared saying that he had a lower body injury dating back to training camp. Luckily, we hear today that this is completely false. So let's dive into it and just hear what Ryan Warsawski had to say about Mac's injury and his status currently. So let's dive right into it for you guys. So let's let's just let's just get into it because it's a big it's a big update today as Macklin remains day-to-day obviously, we don't know what his status is going into tonight so far, you know, obviously the timeline of events was he was a scratch before the Dallas game. He was day-to-day evaluated and then Chris Johnston's training camp claim was corrected. So that's great to hear because if this was an injury that he was dealing with dating back to training camp, then, you know, we don't want to hear that because if he tweaked something in warm-ups, it could have been way worse than what it is. So luckily that's not the case and luckily he's just day-to-day trying to figure out what's going on here with his lower body injury. Right now, I would kind of put him at doubtful for the night's game, but he could be in this lineup tonight. Who knows with what's going to happen over the next couple of hours. All we know is that, you know, it's not as bad as what we thought. So that's a big big update and luckily because we can't go into a season without Macklin celebrating. He's our star guy. We see what happened. Obviously, just the other day in Dallas when we got Shelled 5-0 without him in the lineup and he's a crucial guy on the power play unit for us as well. He's leading the team with two power play points this year. We need him in this lineup every night. He's just a great person at orchestrating this offense and just being a great playmaker, goal scorer that he is, star player that he is. This is a guy that we can't afford to miss a lot of game stress this year. We want to get back to the playoffs and, you know, Warsawski had to speak about this, Chris Johnson claimed saying, that's completely wrong. That's not true. And then Johnson corrected his statement by saying, I misspoke referencing training camp. So that's good, right? We don't want that, like I mentioned. So right now his lower body injury remains under evaluation. He didn't skate Tuesday or Wednesday, but he's still with the team receiving treatment on the road, but there's no confirmed return date at this point. It could be tonight in St. Louis, depending on how he's feeling. I feel like it's probably a game time decision on if he makes it tonight and going into St. Louis in a game that we probably should win anyways, without him, maybe this could give them the opportunity to rest him for this game and get them all ready to go for the next one. But he did just have like two days off before this one. So hopefully he's ready to go. Hopefully he got his treatments and he's feeling better going into tonight's game because it would be nice to see Celebrini obviously in this lineup tonight. We see what happened in Dallas, you know, with the morale was down, we got absolutely smoked in Dallas. So hopefully we can see our captain Macklin Celebrini come back tonight and put on a show and just show everybody that this injury is nothing to worry about. But if he misses tonight's game, I only would think that he would be back in the next one after that. So I don't think it's a big thing to worry about. So hopefully you guys don't either. But in the meantime, if the Sharks do go into this game without him, they must replace Celebrini's impact. And one guy that I'm looking at tonight is Ivar Stenberg. He's been the best player in this lineup during that Dallas game. He looked the best. Obviously didn't get any points up on the board. He has one assist on the year averaging 14 minutes a night. But you know, this guy is tremendous. Like he's great in the neutral zone, breaking up passes, just being that kind of pest in the neutral zone, breaking up, you know, players bursting down the wings, pucks coming across. Like he's just so good at getting his stick active in a neutral zone and it has caused him to create a lot of scoring chances off of turnovers. So I'm looking at Stenberg tonight to be a guy to kind of step up here in St. Louis and have a good game, maybe score his first NHL goal. I know we all would love to see that. And obviously, Celebrini being out of the power play is definitely something that we don't want. And maybe tonight going into tonight's power play, if he is out of the game, we will see Misa step up in this first power play. I think that would be interesting. Maybe we'll see Stenberg. It'd be interesting to see which one of the two do step up. Right now, we're 75% in the penalty kill. The penalty killers have been killing it. We've been literally under attack from power plays this entire season and it needs to stop tonight. Hopefully we can be more disciplined and the power play percentage at 25% isn't too bad. So hopefully tonight with a little bit of a revamped power play unit, maybe bringing Misa or Stenberg up, we can definitely convert on those opportunities. And Smith said if he needs to play center, he's played there his whole life. So he's ready to go. So we could potentially see Leeson drawing from this lineup tonight, Smith slide over to his natural center position, and then the lineup shift up from there. So potentially we could see Sherwood on this top line. We could also see a guy like Chernyshov. It could be interesting to see which kind of line combinations we could see with Smith playing the center role. So, you know, obviously we're going to do a deep dive into that in the live stream. So make sure to tune into that. But yeah, hopefully we don't have this arise and hopefully Celebrini is back. But in a situation that does arise, they learn from their mistakes. Smith should shift to center and bring Leeson in because he had the better preseason and he's better than Delandrea in my opinion. And just taking a look here, Stenberg looks like he's on top of the power play unit in practice today. So that's great news. So obviously he kind of takes place as Celebrini here. Wenberg's just there to win the faceoffs. And Stenberg is a guy who, like Celebrini, can work it around, get the cycle going, try to find players across the crease for one-timers. He's a great player to do this and a great guy to also step up in the absence of this player like I mentioned. They say also Dickinson might not play tonight. So be interesting to see if Allen does draw back in. I think Dickinson didn't really prove enough last game to commit himself to a full-time role. Also, I think Allen gets back in tonight in St. Louis, to be honest with you. And they do talk about the lines here at practice. This is what we looked at for the forward core. It was Sherwood, Wenberg, Toffoli, Marchment, Delandrea, Smith, Chernyshov, Misa, Stenberg, and Goodrell, Ostopchuk, and Graf. So we really were seeing Delandrea, Backup, Smith, and Marchment. And I didn't think they looked good at all in that last game. So hopefully going into tonight, this isn't the case and this isn't the lineup and we can see some changes. The big thing is Misa and Stenberg are together. I think that's a key thing to take away from this, is getting these guys together. We've been talking about it all season. Would really spark the offense of this team. And I think it will with them, obviously. You know, they got Misa, who's a great goal scorer, Chernyshov, who's a great goal scorer, and Stenberg, who's just a playmaking architect. So I think that having all these three guys together would be great tonight. Obviously not a fan of Delandrea coming in. I would like to see Smith slide over. And then getting Leeson in here on this fourth line, maybe bringing Graf up to the top unit. So, or to the top line. So that's kind of where I'm at going into the night. And a big thing tonight is how do they replace the impact of, obviously, Mack and Salambrini. This is kind of what we're looking at here. It's Smith has to handle more creation through the middle. Stenberg offers in our player pay option. Wingers support short exit and puck recovery. And veterans share the difficult defensive shifts. This is kind of what I'm looking at going into tonight, is like, we need to find a better way to enter the zone. Last game we were kind of just chipping it in, getting a change, and we couldn't really get anything going. So we need to start carrying it up through the zone in this game. And start showing them our speed, our skill, and just beating these defenses that way. So hopefully we can see that going into tonight for sure. And obviously, what the update means here is the training camp claim has been corrected for Salambrini, which is great. Treatment is continuing on the road. And prepare for a lineup for either outcome, right? So if it's the regular night and Salambrini is in, we're going to see what we've been seeing all season. Maybe we will see Misa, Stenberg, Chernyshov, because I'd like to see that line. But if not, I think we will go with what's worked so far, which is obviously Salambrini, Smith, and Mertsen, which I really like that line. And then the swag line, obviously, with Stenberg, Wemberg, and Graf. So it'll be interesting to see what happens if Salambrini is in the lineup, if they keep Misa and Stenberg together. My suggestion would be that they should do this, but who knows. But Will Smith has to face off against Robert Thomas. If Salambrini is in, he's the top person on this team. He's going to have to go in and try to beat Robert Thomas, who is beating him in almost every category besides shots on goal here, per digestsports.com. Obviously he's beating him in face-offs, too, because Smith didn't really get many draws. So he did have a lower percentage because he's just coming in off the wing and taking them when Salambrini is shoved off. But look, you see, Robert Thomas obviously wins this matchup. He's playing better than Smith. I think Smith has the ability to really pick it up tonight, go into this game, and really try to be a star for this team, and I really hope we do get to see it from him. Obviously something else I'm looking at going into this game is Shearwood. He was one of the better players in the last game, and going up against a similar matchup for him and Dylan Holloway would be great, obviously. Dylan Holloway beats him in the offensive numbers, but you're not beating Shearwood in the hit department, and this is what he brings, just a momentum shift on this fourth line that way. And just looking at Shearwood against the St. Louis Blues in his last eight meetings, he has .9 goals, he has 1 point and 2.5 shots on goal a game against the Blues, so I mean it's looking good for Shearwood to score one tonight, definitely, with these stats. So hopefully, you know, you see the increase of goals, points, pure difference from his regular season games, like he is way up against the Blues, and he's kind of a blue killer here for us, so hopefully we can see him go out, be impactful tonight for this team for sure, and obviously just want to talk about Smith's current form, he's like we said, he's a guy who's going to need to step up big time. He does have three points through the first three games, so you know, he's a point per game player at this point, two goals, one assist, and like I said, he's a guy who really needs to step up tonight, hopefully we see him in his natural center position. His faceoffs right now are at 75%, obviously in a low sample size, like I said, taking them off the wing, but this is a guy who's going to have to log a lot of minutes tonight, he's going to have to create a lot of offense through, you know, guys like Marchment, and potentially Graf is who I would put up on his line, so hopefully we can see him kind of take this role up, Celebrini, obviously he won't be Celebrini, but if we can see him kind of even take half of Celebrini's role and come out and just lead this team tonight, I would love to see that, and I think we would end up coming out of St. Louis with the win for sure. But obviously, you know, we got a couple of player matchups to watch going into tonight's game. Smith's creation against Thomas' possession game, going to be interesting to see who plays better out of them two, obviously Sherwood's pressure against Holloway's transition threat, see who better plays out of them, obviously we know Sherwood's good against this team. Marchment and Chernyshov are supporting their center, we need to see that, right? We need to see Chernyshov support Misa, and we need to see Marchment support either Delandria or Smith. We need to see that tonight, and we need to see them creating a lot of high danger chances for this team. They got to win the puck before trying to win the rush, right? So they got to have the puck on their stick, get your head up, try to make a play, get the pass up, and just skate it into the zone. Stop this dump and chase, because it's not going to work. It hasn't been working. We need to have better transitions into the zone, but it's going to be an interesting game tonight for sure. I'm definitely very excited for the live stream tonight, and just kind of want to look at our keys of the game going into tonight's game. Protect the slots, high up sticks and rebounds, support shot, short exits and avoid turnovers in the middle, close Thomas' passing lane and track trailing forwards, use the forecheck, make the Blues defend repeatedly, and stay disciplined and get traffic to the net on power play. So that's kind of what we're looking for tonight, getting more in front of the net, in the goaltender's eyes, trying to tip the pucks down, trying to get those garbage goals, and that's kind of what we want to see. And I want to hear your guys' predictions down below in the comments section. Do you think we can win without Celebrity, do you think we've got enough depth to make enough offense to win in St. Louis, or no, do you think that St. Louis offense is too much for us to bear? Let me know down below in the comments. I'm very excited heading into tonight's game. Like I said, I'm going to be on live stream here, probably about 15 minutes before puck drops, so like I said, subscribe to the channel, put those notifications on so you do know when we go live, and it's going to be a fun one tonight. So let me know what your guys' score predictions are down below in the chat, and while you're down there, leave a like, subscribe to the channel as always, I've been your host KC, keep sticking on the ice.