San Jose Sharks defenseman Mario Ferraro (38) scrambles for the puck as the Boston Bruins left wing Brad Marchand (63) is just behind Ferraro at SAP Center in San Jose on Thu Oct 19, 2023 (AP News photo)

Thursday, October 19th, 2023

By Troy Ewers

San Jose, CA – The first four games for the San Jose Sharks have been against the current division leaders. Vegas, Colorado, Carolina, and now Boston. Described to some as the toughest beginning for a Sharks season in their history based on the strength of their opponents this early in the season, each game feeling harder than the last.

This feeling was no different with the San Jose Sharks against the Boston Bruins in the SAP Center and the Sharks coming off a loss against Carolina where they saw six goals pass Mackenzie Blackwood, who despite the score was having a great outing against the Hurricanes.

In this game’s postgame presser, Sharks coach David Quinn made it very clear how he felt his team played, quoted saying “I didn’t like the way we played for most of the night” and also saying “It’s certainly way too soft and way too slow.” This quote brings us to tonight’s game against the Bruins where the focus was to be more physical while not committing as many penalties as they did against the Hurricanes. 

A first period where the San Jose Sharks were going shot for shot with the Bruins and both goalies looking like the heroes this early in the night until Brad Marchand scored his first goal of the season in a shot that surprised the crowd when they saw the puck pass Kaapo Kahkonen. 1-0 Boston.

The second goal for Boston came so quickly that the first goal wasn’t even announced over the PA yet, but 19 seconds after the first goal James Van Riemsdyk scores by pushing a puck in that fans and even some Sharks thought was a frozen puck, but after further review it was a goal, 2-0 Bruins.

After this second goal an overwhelming number of Boston fans started chanting “Let’s Go Bruins” which then was followed by Sharks fans booing the chant from the opposing Boston faithful and then the first period ended with home fans feeling like they were in Boston after the SAP Center erupted for the Bruins.

The second period for Sharks fans can be classified as one word: embarrassing. A whole period went by and after 16:46 the reason the sold out crowd of 17,562 Sharks fans would deem the second period embarrassing would occur.

David Pastrnak went on the attack and bad defense caused Pastrnak to fall ad on the way down, he still accidentally knocked in the puck off of Kaapo’s skate and cheers from Boston fans overshadowed the boos from the Sharks fans and the rest of the second period was a blur for the fans in teal as they were witnessing a 3-0 score going into the third period and it was further proof of this season being the “toughest beginning of a season” ever for San Jose. 

A sign of hope for San Jose came from the high profile offseason signing, Anthony Duclair and he got the goal after leading an attack and on attempted pass to Tomas Hertl, the puck bounces off a Bruins defender and in the goal for Duclair’s first goal as a Shark and San Jose’s first goal of the game. 3-1.

Dueling chants between San Jose and Boston fans serenaded the arena as the third period continued. The Sharks emptied the net to hopefully even out the score, but the deficit was too great as the Boston Bruins celebrated a win on away that felt like a home game for them. 

The Sharks since the start of the last season are now 8-25-12 and this record at home speaks to why this game in particular didn’t feel like the Shark tank advantage that Sharks fans grew up with. With no wins in the first four games of this season showcase the start of a long and grueling season for this team on a rebuild, but the positive in this game is the fact that Duclair got his first goal as a Shark and that should be a silver lining for a dark cloud on the current state of the teal.

The Sharks open a five game road trip in hopes of turning it around. The Sharks start the trip against the Nashville Predators this Sat Oct 21 for a 5:00pm PT puck drop.