Category: San Jose Sharks

Hertl’s First Hat Trick Since ’13 Helps Sharks Get Revenge on Pens in 5-2 Win

Published on by Matthew HarringtonLeave a comment

Photo credit: @LetsGoSharks

By: Jerry Feitelberg

The San Jose Sharks rolled to their seventh straight win Tuesday night, romping the equally-as-hot Pittsburgh Penguins 5-2 in a rematch of the 2016 Stanley Cup Final. Tomas Hertl scored his first hat trick since scoring 4 goals — yes, those four goals, on October 8th, 2013. Evander Kane picked up three assists and Joe Thornton scored the game-winner in his 1,000th game in Teal and Black. All-star Kris Letang and Derick Brassard scored for the Penguins. Martin Jones made 22 saves in net for the Sharks.

Tomas Hertl needed three goals to reach the 100-goal plateau and his empty-netter with 25 seconds left in regulation did the trick, icing the victory over a Penguins team that had won 10 of their last 12 games.

Pittsburgh got on the score sheet first after Letang netted his 11th goal of the season halfway through the first but a Sharks surge found team Teal up 2-1 after one. Marcus Sorensen tipped home his ninth goal of the season with eight minutes left in the period. Sorensen is fresh off signing a two-year contract extension. Hertl then scored his first of three after boxing out a defender on the boards before jamming to the net for his 17th goal of the season 14:05 into the first.

Joe Thornton continued to rack up the milestones, beating Matt Murray 3:39 into the middle period for his 10th goal of the season. Jumbo has now scored 10 goals or more in 18 seasons.

Hertl scored again 2:06 into the third period for the 4-1 lead, but Brassard netted his eighth of the year to pull the Pens within two with just under two minutes left. Hertl converted on the hat trick for his 19th goal of the season and a century mark in goals in his young career.

The Sharks will hit the road for four straight, facing the Arizona Coyotes tomorrow night in the desert. After that, they’ll face the Tampa Bay Lightning after ending their lengthy winning streak earlier in the month. After that, they’ll face the Florida Panthers and Stanley Cup champion Washington Capitals in a back-to-back before players disperse for the All-Star break.

San Jose Sharks podcast with Len Shapiro: Sharks going up against Penguins on Thursday

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Photo credit: @SanJoseSharks

On the San Jose Sharks podcast with Len:

#1 The San Jose Sharks extended their win streak to six games with a win over the Ottawa Senators Saturday night at SAP Center 4-1.

#2 Sharks goals came from Joe Pavelski, Brent Burns, Joe Thornton, and Melker Karlsson.

#3 The Sharks goalie Martin Jones stopped 27 shots out of 28. Jones held Ottawa to just one goal.

#4 How important is it to have Justin Braun back in the lineup again?

#5 The Sharks host the Pittsburgh on Tuesday night, a 7 pm faceoff.

Join Len Mondays on the SJ Sharks podcasts at http://www.sportsradioservice.com

Sharks’ Win Streak at 6, Beat Senators 4-1

Published on by M WalshLeave a comment

Photo credit: @NBCSSharks

By Mary Walsh

SAN JOSE — The San Jose Sharks extended their win streak to six games with a 4-1 win against the Ottawa Senators Saturday. The game was scoreless through almost two periods, but starting with a goal at the end of the second, the Sharks found their scoring touch. Sharks goals came from Joe Pavelski, Brent Burns, Joe Thornton and Melker Karlsson. Martin Jones made 27 saves in the win. Ryan Dzingle scored the lone goal for Ottawa, while goalie Anders Nilsson made 28 saves.

Sharks defenseman Justin Braun was back in the lineup after missing a few games due to injury. With Radim Simek also back recently, only Marc-Edouard Vlasic is still out from the Sharks’ blue line. Early in the first period Saturday, though, forward Joonas Donskoi was injured. Donskoi did not return after a collision with Mark Borowiecki. After the game, their was little news about the injury apart from the fact that it was an upper body one.

All these lineup adjustments have not slowed the Sharks down as they made their way through this winning streak. After the game, Sharks captain Joe Pavelski credited the team’s structure for their resilience: “We’ve got a good structure. I think the group understands what we’re trying to do. Guys are able to slot in, just playing hard, doing things the right way. You need that, for a stretch like this right now, against some good teams.”

The game was scoreless for most of two periods Saturday. The Sharks took and killed two tripping penalties in the first two periods but that was it for the score sheet until late in the second.

The Sharks scored the first goal with just over two minutes left in the second period. Joe Pavelski caught a pass a little awkwardly as he skated into the zone. As soon as he had the puck settled, he took the shot and beat Anders Nilsson with a shot to the top corner. Assists went to Tomas Hertl and Brenden Dillon.

The Sharks scored again at 6:17 of the third period. Brent Burns took a shot from the boards and it went off of Nilsson and then Christian Jaros and in. Kevin Labanc and Justin Braun got assists on the goal.

The Senators got one back 21 seconds later from Ryan Dzingle. The Senators intercepted a clearing attempt by the Sharks and Bobby Ryan found Dzingle on his way across the slot. His shot got past Jones’s glove and went in. Assists went to Bobby Ryan and Zach Smith.

The Sharks had another penalty to kill at 9:44 of the third. Joe Pavelski was called for slashing Chris Tierney after Pavelski’s stick got tangled up in Tierney’s legs. Painful as the result was for Tierney, it did look closer to another trip than a slash.

The Sharks got their first power play at 13:26 of the third, a holding penalty to Jaros. The Sharks did not score on the power play but they did score just after it expired. A blue line shot from Timo Meier hit an Ottawa defender and then went under Nilsson’s pad and in. Joe Thornton helped the puck make its way in for his ninth goal of the season. Assists went to Timo Meier and Brent Burns.

Melker Karlsson added an empty-net goal at 18:39.

The shot count was close throughout the game, and in the end the Sharks held a small edge at 32-28. In the face off circle, the Sharks prevailed 65% of the time.

The Sharks will next play on Tuesday against the visiting Pittsburgh Penguins at 7:00 PM PT.

Sharks win 1,000th game by cooling off Knights in Vegas 3-2

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Credit: AP Photo/John Locher

By: Pearl Allison Lo

It took until the third stanza for the San Jose Sharks to get a lead, but they came back to stop the Vegas Golden Knights’ 12-game home point streak and seven-game overall point streak with a 3-2 win at T-Mobile Arena Thursday night.

The Sharks became the third fastest team to hit 1,000 wins.

Birthday boy goalie Martin Jones (29) made 36 saves to support his team. “We just stuck with it,” said Jones before his birthday song broke out. “Our game got better each period,” echoed captain Joe Pavelski.

Vegas had early goals to start the first and third and outshot the Sharks heavily to begin the first and second, but San Jose scored the only goal of the second on five shots and grinded it out in the third.

Win-wise, it was a four-game streak versus a seven-game streak and the shorter one won. If the Knights had won, they would have tied their franchise record for eight straight wins. Vegas’ longer streak had last been broken November 16, in terms of regulation wins at home.

In terms of the contest (last year the Knights won 6-0), it was a different story, but in 2019, the beginning was similarly written. San Jose fell behind early again. It started with a turnover and the rebound from Ryan Reaves’ shot from the left faceoff circle went right to Tomas Nosek on the other side at 1:34.

The Sharks also went shotless from 2:35 to 12:26, versus nine shots for the Knights, until Tomas Hertl broke out with two shots in four seconds. During the shotless time though, San Jose kept Vegas shotless on their power play.

Marcus Sorensen had a wide open net for the Sharks, but missed and was then tripped by Brayden McNabb at 15:11.  

The second period started similarly as the Knights had a 7-0 shot advantage (three on the power play) until Evander Kane got San Jose’s first with 12:22 left. Three of those shots though, did come on the power play. The Sharks’ Brent Burns hit the goal post with 10:53 left and Vegas’s shot advantage stretched to 11-1 until Hertl things turned around with San Jose’s second shot of the period at 14:04.

#48 then went far side to make it 1-1 as he used Nate Schmidt to block Marc-Andre Fleury’s point of view.

Jon Merrill moved the Knights back up 2:16 into the third. It was his first goal in 54 games, since two years ago.

The Sharks re-tied the game when Burns blasted the puck before the blue line, and kind of like Vegas’s first goal, Melker Karlsson picked up the puck and potted it in net at 7:24.

Not too long after, Hertl corralled the puck behind the net before shooting and then there was a scramble that went on with the loose puck finding its way back to Hertl. He shot again and the puck went off Joonas Donskoi to give San Jose their first lead. That was Donskoi’s fourth goal in three games.

The Knights hit the goal post with 10:30 left.

With a tight contest, both teams did not help their cause, with Fleury creating a delay of game penalty at 13:54, during which Vegas utilized the empty net and shortly after, Brenden Dillon committing a slashing penalty. 

Logan Couture hit the goal post of the empty net right as time expired. There was some discussion after about clock time, but then the game was confirmed over.  

Up Next: The Sharks now head back home for two games, starting with Erik Karlsson’s former team, the Ottawa Senators, Saturday night at 7:00 pm.

San Jose Sharks podcast with Mary Lisa Walsh: Sharks run into hot Vegas Thursday; San Jose finding back of the net and often

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Photo credit: @SanJoseSharks

On the San Jose Sharks podcast with Mary Lisa:

#1 If you like a lot of offense, then Tuesday night’s game was for you. The Sharks crushed the Edmonton Oilers at SAP Center in San Jose by five goals 7-2.

#2 The Sharks are getting their streak on. They have won four straight.

#3 The Sharks just opened up on the Oilers on Tuesday night, scoring three in the first period and two in the second period and third.

#4 The red-hot Vegas Golden Knights host the Sharks on Thursday night. The Knights have won seven straight games.

#5 Vegas goalie Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 27 shots and leads the NHL with 25 wins. Mary Lisa tells us how the Sharks will attack the net on Thursday.

Mary Lisa Walsh does the Sharks podcasts each Thursday at http://www.sportsradioservice.com

Sharks Score Touchdown, Win 7-2 Over Oilers for Fourth Straight

Published on by Matthew HarringtonLeave a comment
Photo credit: @SanJoseSharks

By Jerry Feitelberg

The San Jose Sharks won their fourth game in a row Tuesday night at home, destroying the Edmonton Oilers 7-2 to stay three points behind division-leading Vegas with two games in hand.

Evander Kane and Joonas Donskoi scored two goals, Erik Karlsson picked up three assists, registering a 14th straight appearance with an assist. Marcus Sorensen scored a penalty shot goal for San Jose, Timo Meier and Brent Burns, also had multi-point efforts for San Jose and Aaron Dell made 20 saves. Alex Chiasson and Milan Lucic scored for the Oilers, who have lost eight of their last 10.

The Sharks scored enough goals to win in the first period alone, exiting the period up 3-1. Evander Kane redirected a puck off an Oiler skate behind starting goalie Cam Talbot 6:37 into the game with a Tomas Hertl and Erik Karlsson assisting on the wing’s 15th goal of the year. Kane now has points in six consecutive games. Marcus Sorensen converted his penalty shot chance with 7:03 left in the period and Joonas Donskoi scored just under a minute after Chiasson scored a power play goal with 5:25 left in the frame.

San Jose picked up where they left off in the second, with Kane this time redirecting the puck off his own skate past Talbot 6:32 into the middle frame. Brent Burns and Timo Meier assisted on the goal for a 4-1 lead. Milan Lucic scored just his second goal of the year 10:18 into the second, but Brent Burns power play strike at 15:37 restored the 3 goal cushion and eventually chased Talbot from the game. Talbot made 13 saves before yielding the net to Mikko Koskinen.

Joe Thornton scored on an intended pass to Lukas Radil 1:04 into the third and Donskoi scored his seventh goal in six games at the 10:44 mark to kick the extra point. Erik Karlsson assisted on the goal to collect his third multiassist game in a row.

The Sharks hit the road to face the Pacific division leaders Vegas Thursday night at 7:00 pm. The Golden Knights have won their last seven.

Karlsson Assists in 13th-Straight, Sharks Beat Kings 3-1

Published on by Matthew HarringtonLeave a comment

Photo credit: @NBCSSharks

By Jerry Feitelberg

The San Jose Sharks extended their win-streak to three games Monday night, beating the rival Los Angeles Kings 3-1 at the SAP Center. Erik Karlsson collected his 33rd, 34th and 35th assists to put his streak at 13-games with a helper, becoming the sixth defenseman in league history to do so.

Tomas Hertl scored his 15th goal of the season, Joonas Donskoi stayed hot with his 11th of the year and Joe Thornton pitched in with an empty-net power play strike. Martin Jones made 22 saves and picked up his first assist as a San Jose Shark in the victory. Anze Kopitar scored for the Kings.

Donskoi picked up his seventh point in six games, beating Kings goalie Jack Campbell on a rebound off an Evander Kane shot with 2:17 left in the first period. Karlsson picked up the secondary assist, his first of three assists on the night.

Anze Kopitar tied the game 3:42 into the period after redirecting a Dustin Brown pass behind Jones to tie the game. Ilya Kovalchuk also assisted on the then-tying goal.

Tomas Hertl broke the tie at the 9:09 mark after Martin Jones fed Karlsson behind the Sharks net to start the rush. Karlsson snapped the puck from just inside the San Jose blue line to Hertl as he entered the Kings zone two zones away. Hertl buried the back-hander to put San Jose up 2-1. Joe Thornton would add his seventh goal of the year with 21 seconds left in play, reeling in Karlsson’s clearing pass to put the puck in the empty net. The freebie goal came with the Sharks on the power play, finishing the night 1 for 3.

The Sharks face the Edmonton Oilers in the second game of a back-to-back Tuesday night at 7:30 pm. Aaron Dell is expected to start.

Sharks Ground Lightning with 5-2 Win

Published on by M WalshLeave a comment

Photo credit: @SanJoseSharks

By Mary Walsh

SAN JOSE — With a 5-2 win, the San Jose Sharks handed the Tampa Bay Lightning their first regulation loss in 16 games at SAP Center Saturday night. Evander Kane scored his 199th and 200th NHL goals in the game, while Logan Couture, Joe Pavelski and Lukas Radil also added goals for the Sharks. Lightning goals came from Victor Hedman and Mikhail Sergachev. Martin Jones made 17 saves for the Sharks, while Andrei Vasilevskiy made 28 saves for the Lightning.

After the game, Sharks head coach Peter DeBoer said: “I thought it was a solid sixty minutes for us. I thought we got big contributions, I thought our big guys were really good, especially Karlsson and Burns and Brenden Dillon on defense. Jonesy made some saves when he had to. Special teams were good and I thought all four lines contributed. You know, when you’re playing the best team in the league, we knew we needed that kind of effort and we got it.”

San Jose had some lineup challenges to overcome before the game. With three of their regular defensemen (Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Justin Braun and Radim Simek) out with injuries, the blue line included regular seventh defensmen Tim Heed and Joakim Ryan. Playing in his first NHL game, Jacob Middleton filled out the blue line six. Ryan played with Brent Burns while Heed and Middleton made up a third pair.

After the game, DeBoer talked briefly about the blue line adjustments: “It’s hard to take three defensemen out of your line up and survive and it’s a credit to the young guys who came in. I thought Middleton came in, gave us some good minutes. I thought Joakim Ryan played a real good game and so did Heeder.”

The Sharks opened the scoring at 9:27 of the first. Erik Karlsson’s pass found Timo Meier on his way through the neutral zone. As he crossed the blue line, Meier got a pass to Logan Couture just above the faceoff circle. Couture took the shot as he passed the hash marks and beat Andrei Vasilevskiy. Meier and Karlsson got the assists.

Moments later, at 10:01, Joe Pavelski added one with an impressive turning (and falling) shot right in front of the blue paint. Brent Burns got the assist for finding Pavelski with the pass.

Victor Hedman got one back for the Sharks during an ill-tied line change from the Sharks. Steve Stamkos found him flying up the slot and the Sharks were not quite ready for Hedman to be in position so quickly. Assists went to Stamkos and Ondrej Palat.

The Lightning outshot the Sharks 8-4, but the Sharks won 63% of the faceoffs in the first.

Those faceoff wins helped Evander Kane and the Sharks power play retake a two goal lead early in the second period. Pavelski won an offensive zone faceoff, getting the puck to Erik Karlsson at the point. Karlsson sent it across the ice to Brent Burns, who bumped it back across to Kane. Kane was not far below the blue line and Joe Pavelski had moved to the net, where he screened Vasilevskiy’s view of the shot. Assists went to Burns and Karlsson.

Just seconds later, Mathieu Joseph got by Tim Heed on his way into the Sharks zone. He caught Mikhail Sergachev streaking to the net with a pass and trimmed the Sharks lead to one again. A second assist went to Ryan Callahan.

The second period saw two more penalties killed, one for each team. The Sharks out shot the Lightning in the second period 12-9 but their faceoff win percentage slipped to 56%.

The Sharks got an early power play in the third period, but could not score on it. About half way through that power play, Tomas Hertl sustained an injury during an inadvertent collision. He did not leave the game.

The Sharks did score at 5:18. Evander Kane carried the puck across the blue line, moving past Stralman. Joonas Donskoi kept stride with Kane, staying between him and Stralman as Kane skated below the hash marks and took the shot to give the Sharks a 4-2 lead. An assist went to Brenden Dillon.

Kane went to the box a couple of minutes later for high-sticking Nikita Kucherov, but the Sharks killed the penalty off.

Lukas Radil extended the Sharks lead to 5-2 at 12:20, after Timo Meier tipped a Brent Burns shot. The tip bounced behind Vasilevskiy and out of the blue paint, landing just in front of Radil by the post. Radil lifted it neatly into the net. Assists went to Meier and Burns.

By the end of the game, the faceoff win percentage was dead even between the teams.

The Sharks next play on Monday at 7:30 PM PT against the visiting Los Angeles Kings.

San Jose Sharks podcast with Len Shapiro: Any truth to a Aaron Dell trade before the NHL trade deadline?

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Photo credit: @sjsharkshistory

On the Sharks podcast with Len:

#1 Awful lot of talk about trading Sharks goalie Aaron Dell. How serious is the talk and can the Sharks afford to let him go in a deal?

#2 If a deal were to go through do you see Antoine Bibeau getting the call from AHL’s SJ Barracuda to back up Marty Jones?

#3 What would you attribute as the main reason why the Sharks would consider dealing Dell?

#4 The Sharks did have a 5-1 lead over the Colorado Avalanche on Wednesday night in Colorado, but saw the Aves nearly tied up the game, coming within a goal in a 5-4 win for the Sharks.

#5 The Sharks host one of the hottest teams in the league, the Tampa Bay Lightning, at SAP Center on Saturday night.

Len does the Sharks podcast each Saturday at http://www.sportsradioservice.com

San Jose Sharks podcast with Mary Lisa Walsh: The tale of two cities, Calgary and Colorado, and how the Sharks came away

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Photo credit: @SanJoseSharks

On the San Jose Sharks podcast with Mary Lisa:

#1 The San Jose Sharks and Calgary Flames lit up the lamp, combining with 13 goals in the Flames’ 8-5 win on Monday.

#2 The Flames opened the game with three goals and finished the contest with three goals.

#3 The Flames remain on top of the Pacific Division with 52 points

#4 The Flames’ Matthew Tkachuk and Jimmy Gaudreau each had two goals. The Flames can really provide some offense.

#5 The Sharks first game of 2019 in Colorado on Wednesday night and the Sharks poured on the scoring with two in the first and three in the third. Down 5-1, the Avalanche rallied to pull within one goal in Wednesday night’s game.

Mary Lisa does the Sharks podcasts each Thursday at http://www.sportsradioservice.com