Logan Couture (39) the San Jose Sharks center and team captain with the Los Angeles Kings center Anze Kopitar (11) meet at center ice with former Los Angeles Rams running back Marshall Faulk (28) for the pre game puck drop ceremonies at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles (AP News photo)
By Mary Walsh
The San Jose Sharks defeated the Los Angeles Kings 4-3 in a shootout on Monday. Fabian Zetterlund, William Eklund, Justin Bailey scored for the Sharks in regulation. Zetterlund and Logan Couture scored in the shootout. Kaapo Kahkonen made 44 saves for the win. Trevor Moore, Quinton Byfield and Drew Doughty scored for the Kings and David Rittich mdae 24 saves in the loss.
Midway through the second period, Sharks defenseman Mario Ferraro sustained a lower body injury going into the boards after a hit by Trevor Lewis. He dragged himself to the bench and did not return to play. Sharks Head Coach David Quinn said that he expects Ferraro to miss at least “a couple games.”
Ferraro’s injury left the team short one defenseman for roughly half of regulation. After the game, Quinn said:
“Yeah, it was a gritty one. Listen, obviously we went down to five D there and you could see our D getting tired and they turned it up a little bit there in the third and towards the end of the second. But we just kept battling and competing and I give our D-corps a ton of credit. They turned it up and we answered.”
In a scoreless first period, the Sharks were out-shot by the Kings 18-6. They picked things up in the second. With an extra skater on during a delayed penalty, Fabian Zetterlund scored with a snap shot in the slot at 7:46. Assists went to Mike Hoffman and Tomas Hertl.
William Eklund made it 2-0 with a snap shot at 9:06.. Skating into the zone with Nico Sturm, Eklund caught Sturm’s pass and took the shot from inside the left circle. Assists went to Sturm and Jan Rutta
Trevor Moore got the Kings on the board with a snap shot at 17:06. From the right circle, he put the puck into the far corner. An assist went to Kevin Fiala.
Quinton Byfield tied the game with a slap shot at 1:33 of the third. Adrian Kempe centered the puck from near the goal line and Kahkonen could not get across in time to stop Byfield’s shot. Assists went to Kempe and Jordan Spence.
Justin Bailey gave the Sharks a 3-2 lead at 6:07. Skating in on a breakaway, Bailey’s wrist shot went under Rittich for Bailey’s third of the season. An assist went to Ryan Carpenter.
Drew Doughty tied it again on the power play with six Kings skaters on the ice. He scored with a slap shot from just below the blue line at 18:02. Assists went to Kevin Fiala and Quinton Byfield.
The game went through overtime, during which the Sharks had just two shots to the Kings’ five. In the shootout, Logan Couture and Fabian Zetterlund scored. Kahkonen stopped shots from Trevor Moore and Adrian Kempe.
The Sharks were out-shot by the Kings 47-27 in the game. They won 54.7% of the draws. Logan Couture led the team in face-offs, winning 9 of 14 draws.
The Sharks next play Tuesday, back in San Jose against the New York Rangers at 7:30 PM PT.
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