San Jose Sharks
Shakir Mukhamadullin: Ping Pong Champion?
Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith aren’t the only new additions to the San Jose Sharks room.
In the middle of the locker room, the Sharks have added…a ping pong table.
The ping pong table has become an essential part of the room this year. 🏓
Watch the newest Tank Talk with @BrodieBz and Coach Warsofsky: https://t.co/4r9GKJDN6y pic.twitter.com/VqTOdsHfUG
— San Jose Sharks (@SanJoseSharks) March 19, 2025
So who’s the San Jose Sharks’ best ping pong player?
Shakir Mukhamadullin’s legend is growing.
In February, William Eklund told San Jose Hockey Now that Mukhamadullin was the best of the Sharks’ under-23 players.
Eklund says he beat Smith at ping-pong yesterday, which Smith denied.
Eklund does confirm what I've heard, that Goodrow is #SJSharks locker room ping pong champ.
He also said, among the U23 players, that Mukhamadullin is the best
— Sheng Peng (@Sheng_Peng) February 6, 2025
Head coach Ryan Warsofsky doubled down on that earlier this week, stressing, “Mukhamadullin’s really good.”
So how good is Mukhamadullin?
The young defenseman demurred, “I’m not playing against every guy. I just play the Russian guys.”
But it’s noteworthy that it’s not just the Russians gassing Mukhamadullin up.
What makes the 6-foot-4 Russian so good?
“Long reach?” he smiled.
“He’s long,” Warsofsky said.
The Ufa native shared that he played as a kid with his brother and father.
It sounds like the San Jose Sharks have to determine a locker room ping pong champion.
“We need to make some tournament, to see who is better,” Mukhamadullin said.
Could Barclay Goodrow be the best?
Eklund confirmed Goodrow’s prowess.
“I don’t need to be very good or excellent,” Goodrow told San Jose Hockey Now in October. “I just need to be better than everyone else.”
Mukhamadullin also believes a coach might be the best player in the building.
“Nabby really is good,” Mukhamadullin said of director of goaltending Evgeni Nabokov. Mukhamadullin noted that Nabokov is better than goaltending coach Thomas Speer.
It’s been a long season for the last-place San Jose Sharks, but table tennis has helped them get through it.
“It’s almost therapy for us,” Warsofsky told Brodie Brazil. “It is a grind. We’re going through it. You have to separate yourself at times, or it’ll overwhelm you. That’s something we decided that would be our hobby.”
