The San Jose Sharks right winger Filip Zadina (18) gets a first period pass off against the Vegas Golden Knights at SAP Center in San Jose on Thu Oct 12, 2023 (AP News photo)

Thursday, October 12th, 2023

By Troy Ewers

San Jose, CA – The season has officially started for the San Jose Sharks and they get the “luck of the draw” opening their season against the defending Stanley Cup champion the Vegas Golden Knights. The Knights opened their season beating a good Seattle Kraken team 4-1 with Marchessault and Eichel scoring a goal, Mark Stone locking in two assists, and goalie Adin Hill had 32 saves making their season opening, banner raising ceremony a sign of no slowing down for the Golden Knights.

In this packed Pacific division where the Oilers, Kings, and Kraken who all made the playoffs last season lost to kick off their campaigns to fellow foes in the division Vancouver, Vegas, and Calgary, the Sharks don’t want to get lost in this crowded sea.

San Jose may be in a rebuilding stage, but they still have things to look out for. William Eklund and Alexander Barabanov as possible leading scorers and new editions like Anthony Duclair. For this team, a challenge like the defending Stanley Cup is what they need to set the tone for this new season of teal hockey. 

The first period started with the William Eklund line with him, Mikael Granlund, and Luke Kunin against the Jack Eichel line with Jonathan Marchessault, and Ivan Barbashev and the tone of the game was set early when starting Sharks defenseman Kyle Burroughs dropped the gloves and fought Keegan Kolesar five minutes into the first period.

Even though Burroughs lost the fight the SAP Center was electric. The Eklund line already seems like a change of pace for San Jose in a great way. They are faster and generate an attack that keeps up with Vegas all period.

The Sharks went 0/2 on the power play, but the first score for either team came from Vegas after William Karlsson wrapped around the net, passed the puck to Michael Amadio, who one timed a shot past Kaapo Kahkonen and the score was 1-0 15 minutes into the first period (also assisted by Nicolas Hague).

Kahkonen was lights out except for the one goal, stopping every shot in his path, but the giveaways from San Jose kept Vegas in control possession wise. San Jose would tie this game up 18 minutes into the first period with a laser wrist shot from Filip Zadina (assisted by Henry Thrun and Tomas Hertl), 1-1.

The period would finally close, but Kahkonen still blocked two Vegas shots that seemed like go ahead goals, but no success and the horn went off and the Sharks went into first intermission tied with the defending champs and they walk away knowing that they dodged a bullet with Vegas not fully capitalizing on San Jose’s mistakes.

Second period and Sharks come out more physical with more shots on goal. The Anthony Duclair line with Bordeleau and Barabanov had great chances that actually had Vegas on their toes and the San Jose crowd hype like the game just started.

The Sharks got their first minor penalty after a Matt Benning tripping call, but they killed off the penalty and it seemed like this Sharks defense was locked in, but that changed. The period was flying by with both teams trading attacks, but Vegas broke the stalemate from a Nicolas Hague slapshot assisted by Pietrangelo and Eichel, 2-1 Vegas.

Not even a minute later Vegas scored again and it was by a different Nicolas this time, Nicolas Roy. assisted by his linemates Jonas Rondbjerg and Keegan Kolesar with 36 seconds left in the period, 3-1 Vegas.

The period ended and it felt like an accident happened in front of the crowd, because they were silent and unsure if their Sharks would come back. The confidence everyone had in Kahkonen was depleted, but there was still one more period and the Sharks weren’t ready to give up.

The final period was just a continuation of the second where the Knights continued the domination. Brayden Pachal scored off an assist by Karlsson and Pavel Dorofeyev making it 4-1 Knights. The Sharks attempted to generate some type of offense by sending shots at Logan Thompson, but the whole third period felt like a brick wall was built in the Knight’s net. The third ended with Vegas on top and another one in the win column for the Golden Knights. 

For the Sharks it’s going to be a long season, especially with their next game being against the Colorado Avalanche in San Jose this Saturday at SAP. The turnovers this game need to change if the Sharks want a chance at victories and the defensemen need to give Kahkonen a chance to actually stop shots like he did in the first period.