Eklund, Dahlen, Hatakka, Weatherby Make Sharks Opening Night Roster

The San Jose Sharks have announced their opening night roster:

FORWARDS
Balcers, Rudolfs
Barabanov, Alexander
Bonino, Nick
Cogliano, Andrew
Couture, Logan
Dahlen, Jonathan
Eklund, William
Hertl, Tomas
Labanc, Kevin
Meier, Timo
Nieto, Matthew
Pederson, Lane
Weatherby, Jasper

DEFENSE
Burns, Brent
Ferraro, Mario
Hatakka, Santeri
Karlsson, Erik
Middleton, Jake
Simek, Radim
Vlasic, Marc-Edouard

GOALTENDERS
Hill, Adin
Reimer, James

INJURED RESERVE
Jeffrey Viel

2021 first-round pick William Eklund, 2019 sixth-round pick Santeri Hatakka, 2018 fourth-round pick Jasper Weatherby, and Jonathan Dahlen are in line to make their NHL debuts on Oct. 16 when the Jets visit SAP Center for opening night.

Per the San Jose Sharks, Evander Kane, under NHL investigation for sexual assault, domestic battery, and COVID protocol violations, is “considered a non-roster player pending completion of the NHL’s investigation.” There’s no timeline yet for Kane’s return.

At the moment, Kane’s $7 million dollar cap hit appears to count against the salary cap — we’ll see if that persists.

The #SJSharks opening roster submission has $1.0M of Cap Space w/ 22 players (13F/7D/2G) + Gadjovich/Kane/Knyzhov non-roster/IR & Viel Season Opening IR ($246K Cap Hit).

Includes $1.92M Dead Cap Hit from Jones buyout.https://t.co/MwtsMfRh9R

— PuckPedia (@PuckPedia) October 11, 2021

We’re still not entirely sure why Nikolai Knyzhov isn’t on the IR, but the news hasn’t been great for the sophomore blueliner all preseason. On the outset of training camp, he was declared day-to-day with an unspecified lower-body injury. That timeline was recently shifted to week-to-week and the hope that he would be ready by opening night. Now, the thought is he’ll miss opening night and probably the ensuing five-game road trip.

#SJSharks Bob Boughner says Nikolai Knyzhov remains week-to-week, adds that he wouldn't be surprised if he missed the road trip thru Eastern Canada, Boston and Nashville

— Curtis Pashelka (@CurtisPashelka) October 10, 2021

The San Jose Sharks still have one roster spot available on their 23-man roster — that’s expected to be filled by recent waiver claim Jonah Gadjovich, who’s yet to join the team.