(Photo by Bill Wippert/NHLI via Getty Images)

By Pearl Allison Lo

Captain Brian Gionta had two goals, including his first of the season, as Buffalo won consecutive games for the first time since February, beating the San Jose Sharks 4-1 Tuesday.

After a 45-save NHL-record debut for Troy Grosenik, Grosenik suffered his first NHL adversity, as he started his second straight game. The shot total was the opposite of his debut with only 14 shots, but the Sabres played strong.

San Jose is now 0-7-1 versus Buffalo.

It was a game that was preceded by a snowstorm and featured three disallowed goals, two of them belonging to the Sharks.

Both teams had disallowed goals in the first period, due to contact with the goalies, both wearing #34.

On the second one, which was San Jose’s Matt Nieto against Michal Neuvrith at 17:18, the play ended in Neuvrith leaving the game at the end of the period with a lower body injury. This led to former Sharks’ goalie Artus Irbe suiting up as the emergency backup.

Grosenick gave up his first NHL goal at 5:25 of the second. After a pass from Rasmus Ristolainen, Cody McCormick’s shot hit the Sharks’ Mirco Mueller’s skate first, and Nicolas Deslauriers got the rebound to score.

During a power play at 9:28, an interesting sequence occurred. The Sharks’ Patrick Marleau took down former Shark Torrey Mitchell while he was on a breakaway, but no penalty was called. Then at the other end, at 10:29, Brent Burns imitated teammate Joe Pavelski’s slap shot six seconds earlier, to tie the game against new goalie Jhonas Enroth. Burns was aided by Thornton and Logan Couture.

Gionta’s game winning goal hit the post first as the puck went in at 11:54. He was helped by Brian Flynn and Tyler Myers.

Enroth made a save with his back against Jason Demers at 16:31.

With 11.1 seconds left in the period, Gionta made a cross ice pass to Flynn to make it 3-1 on a 2-on-1.

Perhaps the most controversial of the disallowed goals came in the third period. Marleau had a goal which was initially called as passing the goalline before being fished out at 15:16. After further review however, the goal was taken back and San Jose was awarded a power play for a hooking penalty that had occurred at the same time.

Gionta scored the 4-1 empty netter at 19:18, assisted by Myers and Andrej Meszaros.

Game notes: The Sharks outshot the Sabres in every period, for a total of 30-14. They also won the faceoff battle, while Buffalo won hits and blocked shots. San Jose went 3-4 on their road trip and now will be home for six games, hosting Florida first, Thursday at 7:30p.