Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith will make their San Jose Sharks and NHL debuts tonight.

Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith will make their San Jose Sharks and NHL debuts tonight.

The Sharks duo of Celebrini and Smith will be a staple in the Sharks lineup for years, but that all starts tonight during their NHL debuts.

"If you're thinking too much, that's where you get yourself into trouble," Celebrini said. "[The] more you can trust your preparation and what you've done all year, all summer, throughout your life, to prepare, you just let it come through and not think about it too much."

"I'm just trying to enjoy it all," Smith said. "I mean, you only get one first game. I do some visualization, but not too much. Just trying to enjoy it."

San Jose has not had good starts in the last two seasons. Head coach Ryan Warsofsky told reporters what he thinks the team's mentality needs for a successful start to the season and what he said to the two young superstars.

"Just have a mindset of focus on your first shift. We need to be where our feet are," Warsofsky said. "We have to focus, even myself, on our first shift and making sure we're just dialed in on that one shift. Let's just focus on our shift and what your job is at that particular time."

Celebrini and Smith will have veterans around them on their lines. Celebrini has Tyler Toffoli, and Smith has Mikael Granlund. Since joining the team last summer, Granlund has become one of the Sharks top mentors.

"With Will, he's such a smart kid, smart player. He's going to figure them out like he's going to figure out what the right way to play is, and obviously, with his linemates' tendencies and all that," Granlund said about Smith. "Talk is one thing that helped, for sure, but at same time, you can't go there and think anything. You're going to go out there and play with your instincts, and that's when the best results will come."

Smith said he has 20 people in attendance for his NHL debut. He also told reporters that it is his father's birthday. 

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