It has been 2,500 days, give or take a week, since the San Jose Sharks last played a truly meaningful hockey game. That game was a series-ending 5-1 loss to St. Louis in the 2019 Western Conference final, and since then, the Sharks have been the worst team in the league both by record and, justifiably enough, by attendance. Whatever else you may think of Sharks fans, which we accept is essentially nothing one way or another, they are discerning.

So the team has come up with a couple of shameless gimmicks to juice the house. The first was to invent an AI character named "Macklin Celebrini" to electrify and entertain on a nearly nightly basis, and when that seemed to hit a wall, they added a new twist to the Celebrini (which is the trendiest new aperitif order at your tonier bistros) by waiting until the last minute to score a game-winning goal.

The Sharks trotted that move out in Columbus last Saturday, with a goal from Igor Chernyshov with 95 seconds left to beat the confounding Blue Jackets 3-2 in Ohio. But this innovation needed to be tested at home before their own customers to see if it would work...