Whaddya know, another Sharks shootout win! Team Teal rallied late in the third to take their first game against the Kings 4-3 in the shootout.
San Jose got off to a great start in the first period with the first goal from Timo Meier about one and a half minutes in, fooling Cal Petersen on the backhand. Ryan Donato and Radim Simek were credited with the assists on the first goal. Later on in the first, Logan Couture scored on a one-timer to make it 2-0, which Cal Petersen had no chance of stopping. In addition, on the Couture goal, Patrick Marleau passed Mike Gartner for 80th all-time in assists with 628, and Nikolai Knyzhov recorded his first NHL point.
After leading 2-0 through one, the curse of the second period is at it again. The Sharks allowed the Kings to come back and tie the game during the second period. The first Kings goal was from Anze Kopitar, while the second one was from Dustin Brown on the power play after the Sharks' bench took a silly penalty for too many men on the ice. No one knows why the Sharks letting off the accelerator in the second period has become a trend this season. San Jose now has a differential of -15 in the second period, which desperately needs to be fixed.
In the middle of the third, Dustin Brown notched his second goal of the game to give the Kings their first lead of the game 3-2. The Sharks needed another goal rather quickly, and they finally got one after Evander Kane took a few swings at the net and got one past Cal Petersen to tie it at three with 45 seconds remaining in regulation. Brent Burns and Logan Couture recorded the helpers on the Kane goal that sent the game to overtime. The Sharks had some great chances to put it away for good in overtime but weren't able to execute on them.
We find ourselves in the shootout once again. All the Sharks needed to win in the shootout was a successful attempt from Logan Couture and Martin Jones to be a brick wall, and the rest is history. San Jose is now 5-5-1 through 11 games in the 2021 campaign, four of those wins coming in the shootout. Although it is best for the Sharks to win games in regulation moving forward, a win is a win, and that's all that matters. If Evander Kane hadn't tied it in the last minute of regulation, this would've been a terrible, pathetic, and unacceptable Sharks loss, especially considering that the Kings are in a rebuild and aren't supposed to very competitive.
Martin Jones stopped 24 of 27 shots from the Kings in last night's game and made some incredible saves in crucial moments throughout the game and in the shootout.
Other than moving up the all-time assists list, Patrick Marleau passed Jaromir Jagr for third in all-time games played with 1,734. He now only trails Mark Messier and Gordie Howe on the all-time games played list.
Besides the second period, the biggest issue for the Sharks this season has been their power play, which continues to look abysmal this season. They have converted on only one of their last 29 chances on the man advantage in their last eight games, which needs to be improved badly if they were to become more consistent and competitive this season.
To me, the outcome of this game was a big sigh of relief. The Sharks will close out their current series against the Kings and their current road trip on Thursday at 7 pm PT and aim to get their first series sweep of the season. Devan Dubnyk is expected to start in net on Thursday and has been the better overall goaltender for the Sharks as of late.
The two photos below were from the most recent NHL game I attended over a year ago.
Sources: NBC Sports Bay Area/California, ESPN
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