When Marc-Andre Fleury made his NHL debut in 2003, Macklin Celebrini was nearly three years removed from his birth.
On Thursday, the two combined for some statistical novelty when the San Jose Sharks phenom and the league’s youngest player scored on the Minnesota Wild goaltender – the NHL’s oldest.
“Good for him,” Fleury said with a laugh when told about the statistic.
Celebrini, the top pick in the NHL draft, scored twice in the Sharks’ 5-2 loss to the Wild. At 18, Celebrini is more than twenty years younger than Fleury, who has been in the league for 21 years and has indicated that this will be his last season.
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“He’s been in the league longer than I’ve been alive, so it’s been great to see his career,” Celebrini said of Fleury. “Obviously he’s ridden with Pittsburgh and Vegas, and even with him in Chicago and now Minnesota. He seems like a great personality, and it was just as much fun watching his antics off the ice as his on the ice.”
Celebrini’s first goal came when he was in the right place at the right time in a 3-on-2 rush. His second was a wrist shot, a no-look goal that whistled past Fleury’s glove, off the crossbar. The 18-year-old had a team-leading seven shots and his second multi-point performance in three career games in what was his best game yet of his young career.
“He knows where guys stand,” Fleury said. “He has a good shot. I love that last goal. I wish I could get it back, but it was still good. Right on the crossbar above my head. I’m looking forward to watching him.”
Fleury himself made history Thursday by playing in his 1,029th career game, tying Patrick Roy for the most NHL goaltenders.
He also won what could have been his last match in San Jose, and is on an eight-match Shark Tank win streak. Fleury helped the Pittsburgh Penguins to the Stanley Cup in 2016, winning the championship in Game 6 in San Jose.
He said he will have fond memories of the building.
“The atmosphere in the Tank is always good when the play-offs come around,” Fleury said. “It’s buzzing. Even in the regular season, they’ve had a good team for so many years when I played, and it was always a tough game.”
