The New York Rangers entered Thursday night's home game at Madison Square Garden with a seemingly golden opportunity to get back on track following a previous loss to the Minnesota Wild. Instead, New York became the first victim in the 2025-26 NHL season of Macklin Celebrini and the San Jose Sharks.
The Sharks, who started the day winless through six games, came away with a 6-5 win via overtime in the Big Apple.
The loss to San Jose left forward J.T. Miller and defenseman Adam Fox furious about the Rangers' effort against a supposedly very beatable opponent.
“Pretty piss poor out of us,” Fox said of New York's performance, particularly in the first period, where the Sharks scored the first two goals of the contest (h/t Peter Baugh of The Athletic).
“Not the identity we want to build here,” Miller shared.
The Sharks got on the board quickly against New York, with Adam Gaudette finding the back of the net just two minutes into the contest. Celebrini scored the game's next goal minutes later to put San Jose up, 2-0. Taylor Raddysh trimmed the Rangers' deficit in half with five minutes left in the period, but the Sharks responded with Celebrini's second goal of the evening with under a minute remaining before the first intermission for a 3-1 San Jose lead.
The second period saw New York roar back, as they grabbed the lead with three consecutive goals, but Celebrini tied it up 4-4 after Celebrini lit the lamp again to complete a hat trick. In the third period, the Sharks and the Rangers traded goals to send the game into overtime, where Will Smith won it for San Jose with a game-winning snipe off the assists from Celebrini and Alex Nedeljkovic.
WILL SMITH WINS IT IN OT 🚨 pic.twitter.com/JvYg41DwMo
— Sharks on NBCS (@NBCSSharks) October 24, 2025
New York barely won the possession battle over the Sharks, as the Rangers outshot the visitors, 27-24. The Rangers even had more quality looks on offense, as evidenced by their 13 high-danger shots to just seven by the Sharks. But New York did not make the stops when it mattered. New York netminder Igor Shesterkin allowed all of San Jose's goals on just 24 shots faced.
The Rangers, who dropped to 3-4-2, will look to stop the bleeding as they start a four-game road trip this coming Sunday against the Calgary Flames.
