By Ivan Makarov

Hungry for a revenge for getting knocked out by the LA Kings in last year’s Stanley Cup playoffs, San Jose Sharks started this year’s playoffs with a bang. Completely dominating the game in the first two periods and preserving their big lead in the third, they took the charge in the series after 6-3 victory in Game 1 at the SAP Center.

Sharks dictated the pace of the game from the start of the game with their physical play and aggressive forecheck, which opened the game for them and limited Kings’ scoring chances. Joe Thornton scored less than three minutes into the game. Battling along the boards, and carrying the puck behind the net, he somehow managed to get it to his lineman Joe Pavelski who had just an inch of extra space on his defenseman in front of the net. Pavelski shot it on goal and Thornton was there with a tip in goal.

Sharks continued to outplay the Kings by finishing all their checks. Their fourth line was the most effective in that area, with Raffi Torres using his skating and hitting abilities to keep the high pace to the game. But it was Mike Brown who had the most memorable moment in that period when he got away on a breakaway, shot the puck and then pushed one of the Kings defensemen into Jonathan Quick, visibly rattling the Kings’ goaltender and causing a heated exchange to erupt after the whistle.

“We want to play physical, and us [fourth line] especially when we get on the ice,” said Brown. “We got to get pucks deep on their defensemen. We got to let them know that we’re coming and that’s what we did and established right away.”

Sharks made it 3-0 before the first intermission when Tomas Hertl and Patrick Marleau scored within 48 seconds of each other.

They did not slow down there and scored two more in the second period, with Raffi Torres scoring in his comeback from injury after Marc-Eduard Vlasic hit the post moments earlier. Vlasic scored himself four minutes later on the power play with a great wrist shot from just above the face-off circles.

Going into the third period with 5-0 lead, Sharks did lose focus a bit, and allowed the Kings to get back into the game, and cut the home team lead to just two goals. But the Kings ran out of time, and Sharks tightened it up on defense in the final two minutes of the game. With Kings’ goaltender out of the net for extra skater, Brent Burns released the tension on the ice when he picked up a puck near the boards inside his zone and shot it from long range but on target into the open net, finalizing the score in the game at 6-3.

While the Sharks did not finish the game on a high note, there were too many positives in that game to be too upset about it.

“It was a great game – we won!” said Sharks head coach Todd McLellan when asked about what his takeaway from this game was. “We’ll talk about the third period and I was disappointed in how we responded there. But it was a really good game…. It’s over. Regardless of what the score was, we have to move on now and prepare to get better.”

Game 2 is this coming Sunday back at the SAP Center.