by Larry Leavitt

SAN JOSE–Sharks head coach Todd McClellan has really pushed the Sharks practices back and he’s even given the team some strong practices in prepartion of this Thursday’s game in Philadelphia to start the second half of the season. The key player during the Olympic break Sharks goalie Antti Niemi who played in the Olympics will be back in camp with Joe Pavelski who played a lot during the first half had some time to rest during the break and it was well needed.

Marc-Edouard Vlasic and Patrick Marleau who were in the Sochi Olympics will be returning and they have been playing at a high level and they have this high of being at the Olympics and winning the gold so they’re the ones to be watching for. If there is one person to be concerned about is Marleau he seems to be playing the most minutes for most forwards for Canada.

Marleau’s age and experience we’ll have to see if that has any effect on him coming back into the NHL regular season. Marleau is coming back from Sochi after winning the gold and the championship for Canada and is in need to come back and recoup a little bit from the tough competition at the Olympics. Marleau like his other Shark teammates who were in the Olympics will need to come back from the emotional high as well as the tough physical work he performed.

For the Sharks Logan Couture he went home to Canada for the Olympic break and he did work hard in during the break and he was also at some of the Sharks practices towards the end of the break in San Jose. Couture said he liked the harder practices and pushing the team harder to another level.

The question is about the return of Raffi Torres, we haven’t seen him skate yet, we’ve heard a lot of reports and remember the last time he had ACL surgery it took him over a year to recover and this time it’s five months later and five months is a quick turn around for an ACL.

Torres gives a lot of credit to the medical staff, trainers and coaches for getting him back in shape and ready to go. Will Torres have the hand eye coordination coming back? Probably not because he hasn’t had a lot of practice time with that injury. He took a shot off the back foot and not many people at the Sharks are concerned with that and he’s back at practice ready to go back to work.

Larry Leavitt does weekly commentary on the Sharks for Sportstalk radio