NHL - Sharks Round Up - March 12-20, 2017

Stars @ Sharks 1-5 - Sunday, March 12, 2017

Joe Pavelski scored two goals and Aaron Dell made 29 saves to help the San Jose Sharks to a 5-1 win against the Dallas Stars at SAP Center. Patrick Marleau, Joel Ward and Chris Tierney also scored for the Sharks (41-20-7), who rebounded from a 3-1 loss to the Nashville Predators on Saturday and remained seven points ahead of the Anaheim Ducks for first place in the Pacific Division.

Remi Elie scored for Dallas (27-31-10). Kari Lehtonen allowed three goals on eight shots and was pulled early in the second period for former Sharks goalie Antti Niemi, who made 16 saves. Marleau gave San Jose a 1-0 lead at 3:56 of the first period. He took a pass from Logan Couture and beat Lehtonen from the right circle to the far side. Elie capitalized on a Sharks turnover and knocked his own rebound past Dell from close range at 12:54 of the first period for his first NHL goal to make it 1-1. Pavelski put the Sharks back ahead 2-1 at 17:14 with a wrist shot from the right circle on an odd-man rush. The Stars outshot San Jose 15-6 in the opening period. Ward extended San Jose's lead to 3-1 at 2:46 of the second period with a wrist shot from the slot. Pavelski scored a shorthanded goal on a breakaway at 12:26 of the second to make it 4-1. Tierney scored from the slot at 3:34 of the third.
* With Jannik Hansen streaking down the left side and creating a 2-on-1 rush, Pavelski kept the puck down the right and scored on a wrist shot to the far side.

 

* Dell did some of his best work in the first period when he made 14 saves, including a pad save of Jamie Benn's wrist shot from the slot at 14:55.

* Hansen had four hits, two takeaways, drew a penalty and has a plus-2 rating in 13:21 of ice time.

* Pavelski was on the ice to take a faceoff during a penalty kill and jumped on a turnover by Stars defenseman Esa Lindell at the blue line, skated to the other end and beat Niemi with a wrist shot into the upper right corner of the net for his second goal. It was his ninth career short-handed goal and first since Feb. 1, 2014.
* Sharks defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic played his 800th NHL game. ... Marleau scored his 504th NHL goal and moved past Peter Bondra into 42nd place on the all-time list. ... Defenseman Greg Pateryn played his second game for the Stars since being acquired from the Montreal Canadiens on Feb. 2. ... Sharks forward Melker Karlsson was out of the lineup because of a lower-body injury. ... Sharks defenseman David Schlemko (lower-body injury) missed his fifth straight game but resumed skating Sunday morning.

"It's always going to be a race to the end, and everyone wants to be in that top spot. You want to get home ice. I think we always are watching who we'd be playing or how other teams are faring." Paul Martin

"We had a good effort tonight. First period, I thought we started a little slow, which is probably natural in a back-to-back. I thought in the second and third period we started to play our game. That's not an easy game to play. They're a desperate team. They've got a lot of skill and speed, and Dell let us get our legs under us. I thought he was excellent early and from there we took over." Peter DeBoer said.

"A lot of guys played pretty big roles tonight. I don't think it was one or two or three guys. Tonight was an effort on a back to back. It's a four-line game. That's how we win. That's how we believe we will win here." Pavelski said.

"It's tough to describe. It's been hard, and we just have to keep on working and doing our best and not be too focused on all the negative stuff that's happened." Antti Niemi

Buffalo Sabres @ Sharks 1-4 - Tuesday, March 14, 2017
Joe Pavelski scored two goals to help the San Jose Sharks to a 4-1 win against the Buffalo Sabres at SAP Center. Micheal Haley and Logan Couture also scored, and Martin Jones made 22 saves for San Jose (42-20-7), which moved nine points ahead of the Calgary Flames and Anaheim Ducks for first place in the Pacific Division. The Sharks trail the Chicago Blackhawks by two points for the Western Conference lead. Pavelski has seven goals in his past five games and leads the Sharks with 28 this season. Jack Eichel scored, and Robin Lehner made 37 saves for the Sabres (28-30-12), who had won five straight games in San Jose and were 10-0-1 in their past 11 games against the Sharks before Tuesday. The Sharks had a season-high for shots on goal in any period when they had 20 in the first, but trailed 1-0. Eichel beat Jones with a wrist shot for his 20th goal 1:10 into the game.

Pavelski made it 1-1 at 11:47 of the second period when he beat Lehner with a snap shot from the slot on a power play. The Sharks took advantage of a Sabres miscue to take a 2-1 lead at 19:10 of the second on Haley's goal from close range. Sabres defenseman Cody Franson sent a backhand pass in his own end from below the goal line toward Eichel, but Haley reached out and appeared to deflect the puck off Eichel's stick then skate, and between Lehner's pads. Pavelski scored again at 5:28 of the third period on a snap shot from the left circle to make it 3-1. Couture extended San Jose's lead to 4-1 at 14:57, deflecting a rolling puck from close range off Lehner's stick and over his shoulder.

* Joe Thornton hit Couture with a pass below the goal line, and Couture sent a backhand pass through traffic to Pavelski for his first goal of the game.

* Lehner made a left-pad save of a wrist shot by Brent Burns from the right of the crease with 2:29 left in the second period.

* Burns didn't have a point, but he had a game-high seven shots on goal and led the Sharks with three blocked shots.
* Pavelski quickly got to a loose puck in the left circle after DeMelo's shot from the point deflected off a Sabres player and scored his 28th goal on a snap shot.
* Eichel became the first Sabres player to score at least 20 goals in his first two NHL seasons since Thomas Vanek in 2005-06 and 2006-07. ... Sharks forward Melker Karlsson missed his second straight game because of a lower-body injury.

"I think we were determined to win this game regardless of whether we got a bounce or not. We had one called back in the first. We didn't win because of a bounce; we won because we earned that win and we were the better team all night right from the drop of the puck. I think we knew the history and we wanted to put an end to it."
"In the short time I've known him, [Pavelski] cranks it up this time of year. Those type of guys see the finish line here and the playoffs and they start to get really excited." Peter DeBoer said.
"[Pavelski's] got the hot hand. He does it every night, though. If it's not scoring goals, he's doing something. He works hard all the time in practice. They maybe weren't going in as much as he'd like to early on, but he stays with it and he's got such great talent around the net. We knew he'd break through, and he's playing huge for us right now." Dylan DeMelo said.

Anaheim Sucks @ Sharks 2-1 - Saturday, March 18, 2017

Jonathan Bernier made 33 saves, and Jakob Silfverberg scored what proved to be the game-winning goal on a breakaway in the second period to help the Anaheim Ducks to a 2-1 victory against the San Jose Sharks at SAP Center.
Patrick Eaves also scored for the Ducks (38-23-11), who moved within four points of the first-place Sharks in the Pacific Division. Logan Couture scored for the Sharks (42-22-7), and Martin Jones made 25 saves. Bernier, who made 30 saves in a 2-1 shootout loss to the Buffalo Sabres on Friday, has started four straight and 10 of the past 11 games in place of John Gibson, who has a lower-body injury. Bernier is 4-0-1 with a 0.98 goals-against average and a .969 save percentage in his past five starts. The Ducks took a 1-0 lead 39 seconds into the game when Eaves took a pass in the left circle from Getzlaf and beat Jones with a wrist shot to the far side. Getzlaf became the second player to have 800 points with the Ducks, joining Teemu Selanne (988). Couture made it 1-1 with a 5-on-3 power-play goal at 19:13 of the first period. Couture took a short pass from Joe Thornton in the right circle and elevated a snap shot to the short side for his 25th goal of the season in his 500th NHL game. The Ducks regained the lead on Silfverberg's unassisted goal at 13:29 of the second period. He blocked a shot by Sharks defenseman Paul Martin, headed the other way and beat Jones from the slot to make it 2-1.

* Eaves was wide open in the left circle when Getzlaf sent him a cross-ice pass that Joe Pavelski barely got his stick on but couldn't stop. Eaves hit his spot in the upper right corner of the net for his 24th goal.

* Micheal Haley came out of the penalty box, got the puck and went on a breakaway, but Bernier made a glove save of his wrist shot from the slot at 16:01 of the first period.

* Silfverberg blocked a shot near the blue line, outskated everyone to the other end and placed a snap shot over Jones and just under the crossbar.

* Patrick Marleau tied for Sharks lead in hits with five and had three shots and one takeaway.

* Sharks forward Jannik Hansen left the game because of an undisclosed injury with 9:45 remaining. DeBoer did not have an update on Hansen's condition. … Ducks forward Andrew Cogliano played his 776th consecutive game to tie Craig Ramsay for the fourth-longest such streak in NHL history. … Anaheim went 3-0-2 in the five-game season series against San Jose. Each game was decided by one goal. … Ducks forward Ondrej Kase returned to the lineup after being scratched the previous two games and replaced Jared Boll.

"I didn't like our first 10 minutes, but after that I thought it was a playoff-type atmosphere. We had enough opportunities to get three or four tonight. We didn't. That's a credit to their goalie." Peter DeBoer said.

"We generated a lot of chances. I had multiple good looks." Couture said.

"Obviously I made the mistake on the one that cost us a goal, but I think the way we played is the way we want to play, especially in the second and the third. We just weren't able to find the back of the net." Paul Martin said.

Sharks @ Stars 0-1 - Monday, March 20, 2017

Kari Lehtonen made 30 saves and Curtis McKenzie scored the only goal to help the Dallas Stars to a 1-0 win against the San Jose Sharks at American Airlines Center. The Sharks (42-23-7) have lost three straight games for the second time this season. They are four points ahead of the Edmonton Oilers and Anaheim Ducks in the Pacific Division race. It was the Stars' second shutout of the season and the first since Lehtonen made 23 saves in a 3-0 win against the Colorado Avalanche on Dec. 3. Dallas (29-33-10) won for the second time in the past six games. McKenzie scored at 14:54 of the second period when he positioned himself in front of the net and deflected a point shot by Adam Cracknell into the net. Aaron Dell made 19 saves for the Sharks, including a couple of highlight-reel stops. Dell stopped Cody Eakin on a one-timer with 6:04 remaining in the first period. In the second period, he gloved Brett Ritchie's shot to thwart a 2-on-1. Lehtonen made his toughest save in the first period when he kicked away a chance by Logan Couture with his left toe with 8:17 remaining.

* McKenzie drove hard to the net and then signaled to Cracknell with his stick. "I was kind of waving the flag," McKenzie said. "Not often that you get that much time in front. Just doing anything to make sure he saw me in front there."

* Lehtonen was almost caught out of position in the first period and thought Couture was going to shoot, but he scrambled to make the save. "It was just a difficult situation when Couture has some time and I'm already down so I kind of have to play, do something tricky," Lehtonen said. "That's where the long legs came to help me."

* Ritchie and Tyler Seguin had a 2-on-1 with a minute remaining in the second period, but Dell made a glove save and recovered in time to cover the rebound.

* Seguin won 10 of 13 faceoffs. He had one takeaway and one blocked shot in 17:56 of ice time.

* Sharks center Sean Tierney missed the game due to illness. Right wing Jannik Hansen was out because of an undisclosed injury. … It was Lehtonen's 36th NHL career shutout.

"It's really been a big year for them [the fourth line]. Adam [Cracknell] did a real good job of hanging on the puck. I thought that line had two or three good opportunities during the night, but Curtis [McKenzie] did a good job getting to the front of the net and got his stick on it." Lindy Ruff.

"Chances are there, so we've just got to bear down and we've got to get one dirty or ugly around the net. We've got to get one on the power play some way, somehow to take a little pressure off the group because it's hard to win when you're only getting one or no goals like we have the last couple of games. Right now we're cold, but we're paying a price for that." Pete DeBoer said.
"The other night we got a lot of quality looks I think, and chances are when you get those looks throughout a night, you're going to score three and four. Tonight, I don't think they were as good, probably not as many. I don't think they had as many. It was a pretty tight game. You look up halfway through the game and shots are 12-9 or something like that, so there wasn't a whole lot of room out there. In a moment like that, special teams got to take over and generate a little bit more, somebody has got to step up. Had a few looks; we just got to find a way to crack it." Joe Pavelski