Macklin Celebrini break out star for Team Canada at Olympics

Back on American soil, Canada’s breakout star of the Milano Cortina Olympics, Macklin Celebrini, is still stewing over the outcome of the gold-medal men’s hockey game.

“We were so close. Whatever excuses you want to make about the game for us, at the end of the day, we didn’t win,” Macklin Celebrini said Wednesday upon rejoining the Sharks. “It’s bitter. It’s sour that we didn’t win, and we came that close.”

Celebrini was the youngest NHL player in Milan and the youngest ever to play for Team Canada. Still, he led all scorers with five goals and trailed only three-time NHL MVP Connor McDavid (13) with 10 points in six games.

The 19-year-old phenom wasn’t on the ice for the 3-on-3 overtime period, which ended with Jack Hughes finding the back of the net to win Team USA’s first Olympic gold in the sport since 1980.

But the sour feeling of the 2-1 defeat, he said, will stick with him “forever.”

“A lot of people say you learn more from losing than winning. Definitely did. That hurt,” Celebrini said, sporting a fresh scar below his left eye. “It hurt when they put the silver medal around our neck. We waited around there for about 30 or 40 minutes after the game, just standing on the ice, watching them celebrate.”

Adding to the sting of defeat was the roundabout route it took for Celebrini to make it back to San Jose from Milan. He will have just one practice under his belt when the Sharks resume their regular season Thursday night after initially landing in Miami and getting help from the Panthers to complete his last leg of the approximately 6,000-mile journey.

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“It’s tough getting back from Italy when you’re on the West Coast, so they had to piece it together,” Celebrini said. Bill Zito, the Panthers’ general manager, told reporters that Sharks GM Mike Grier texted him his appreciation for getting his star home.

Celebrini, of Italian heritage, didn’t have much time to explore his homeland. But the presence of his family, including father Rick, the Warriors’ head trainer, “made it feel like home.” The hockey players didn’t stay in the Olympic Village, but Celebrini said he spent a lot of time there interacting with athletes from other sports.

The Sharks, led by Celebrini’s 81 points (fourth in the NHL), have emerged as surprise playoff contenders after posting the NHL’s worst record the past two seasons. With 27 games left, starting Thursday against the Flames, the Sharks (27-24-4) are five points out of their first postseason appearance since 2019.

Celebrini said he can feed off the Olympic experience for the stretch run. Pavol Regenda (Slovakia), Philipp Kurashev (Switzerland) and Alex Wennberg (Sweden) all made the quarterfinals with their respective countries. But while Celebrini’s other Sharks teammates were enjoying time off during the three-week Olympic break, he was sharing a locker room with some of the greatest players alive: McDavid, Sidney Crosby and Nathan MacKinnon, to name a few.

“A lot of those guys I’ve looked up to my whole childhood,” Celebrini said. “A lot of them have won Stanley Cups. Being around them and knowing what you have to do to get to that goal, even though we didn’t do it, you can see the habits and the preparation that it took.”

Celebrini was especially awed by McDavid and MacKinnon, who, he said, showed him “just where the bar is at.” Behind the scenes, the pair was responsible for “probably the fastest practices I’ve ever been a part of,” Celebrini said. They made up Canada’s three-man overtime line along with Cale Makar, which Celebrini described as “probably had the three best players in the world.”

Celebrini isn’t sour about the Olympics’ unique overtime rules.

“There’s a reason why the Stanley Cup isn’t determined 3-on-3,” he said. “But you can’t complain about it or whine about it when it’s the same for them.”

Celebrini shrugged off a question about the whereabouts of his silver medal. Still a teenager and having just affirmed his position as one of the best in the world, surely he will get another chance — or three — at the prize he is truly after: Olympic gold.

Asked if he would consider doing it again in four years in the French Alps, Celebrini had to repeat the question to augment his enthusiasm.

“Would I go back to the Olympics in four years?” he said, pausing as a smile came across his face. “Yeah.”