Celebrini’s Power-Play Spark Couldn’t Hide San Jose’s Five-on-Five Void

Macklin Celebrini gave the San Jose Sharks a route back into Wednesday’s game. Erik Haula restored the Kings’ three-goal lead six minutes later.

Celebrini’s power-play goal arrived 5:07 into the second period, a high-slot wrist shot that traveled through bodies and cut Los Angeles’ lead to 3-1. The response came 6:03 later, when Haula converted a centering pass from Connors at even strength. The Kings restored their three-goal cushion, and San Jose spent the rest of the night trying to recover through special teams.

That is the cleanest way to read Los Angeles’ 7-2 victory at Crypto.com Arena. The Sharks won the shot count 32-27 and scored twice on six power plays. The Kings scored four times at even strength and went 3 for 5 with the man advantage. San Jose’s shot total looked respectable; its ordinary attack did not.

The problem appeared before Celebrini’s goal. Adrian Kempe opened the scoring 1:23 into the first period after getting loose for a wrister released in the slot. At 16:09, he struck again on a right-circle one-timer, with Gustafsson and Clarke helping create the play. Quinton Byfield then put Los Angeles up 3-0 with the extra skater at 18:38.

Kempe was the game’s sharpest finisher, producing a four-point night with three goals in his return after missing Saturday against Buffalo because of illness. His first goal punished a defensive breakdown in space. His second showed the Kings moving the puck into a favorable shooting position.

Neither required a complicated explanation: Los Angeles found finishing chances at full strength, then capitalized when San Jose handed it extra opportunities.

San Jose had two power plays in the opening period and converted neither. That left the Sharks trailing while also lacking a five-on-five answer. Celebrini’s goal briefly changed the temperature of the game, but the response from Haula exposed how little margin San Jose had created during ordinary shifts.

Los Angeles kept finding contributors. Panarin finished with four assists, touching several of the night’s decisive sequences, including the pass on Byfield’s first goal and the setup behind Kempe’s later power-play finish. Kempe supplied the finishing touch; Panarin repeatedly made the final pass easier to use.

Byfield scored twice with the advantage, once in the first period and again at 14:28 of the third after a Panarin shot was tipped.

The Kings’ second-period power-play goal came at 15:51, when Kempe finished from the left circle on a feed from Laferriere, with Panarin also assisting. Before that, San Jose had already allowed Haula’s even-strength goal. After it, the Sharks still could not generate a normal-strength reply.

Their only remaining goal came with an extra skater: Ivar Stenberg’s shot at 9:41 of the third deflected off Joel Edmundson.

Joel Armia added another even-strength goal early in the third, with Haula assisting. Those two goals separated the teams more clearly than the shot count did. San Jose put eleven shots on net in the first, ten in the second and eleven in the third, yet none of its even-strength attacks reached the scoreboard.

Los Angeles, meanwhile, scored four times without needing a penalty to create the opening.

Darcy Kuemper deserves credit for ensuring the Sharks’ volume never became a problem. He stopped 30 of 32 shots, handling the opportunities San Jose did create. Kuemper stopped thirty shots, enough to leave San Jose's good chances as isolated moments in a defeat.

San Jose goaltender Askarov made 20 saves on 27 shots; the score alone does not assign every goal to him, especially with Los Angeles repeatedly creating advantages before the finish.

San Jose’s penalty trouble made the deficit harder to repair. The Kings’ three power-play goals followed penalties to Toffoli, Bystedt and Ostapchuk. Celebrini also took two penalties, but Los Angeles did not score on those advantages. The Sharks’ special teams were not empty-handed, yet a 2-for-6 power play cannot rescue a team that goes scoreless at five-on-five while the opponent scores four times there.

A players-only meeting followed the defeat, but its private content should remain private. The public portion is plain enough: San Jose has lost three in a row and five of six, allowing 24 goals across those six games. That stretch does not explain every roster or systems question, but Wednesday supplied a specific one. The Sharks need offense that survives the absence of a whistle.

Celebrini and Stenberg showed the power play can provide a finish. The next ordinary shift needs to produce one too—before another deficit turns San Jose’s attack into a search for penalties rather than a source of goals.

Sources

NHL: official game summary and completion time

NHL: official final box score

NHL: game report

San Jose Sharks: Pohlkamp recall announcement