The Sharks lose their eighth in a row as they go down to the Wild 6-3 and conclude their season series with Minnesota with a 3-5-0 record. On the other hand, with their win Saturday night, the Wild become the third team to clinch a playoff berth this season, joining the Golden Knights and Avalanche, who all happen to be in the West Division.
The start to this game was disastrous for the Sharks as they gave up three goals in the first period to Ryan Suter, Marcus Foligno, and Jared Spurgeon. Martin Jones was pulled after the first period and was replaced by Josef Korenar to start the middle frame. Kevin Fiala added one more for the Wild in the second to go up 4-0 through two periods.
The Sharks began to mount a comeback in the third period, starting with Logan Couture's 15th goal of the year to finally put the Sharks on the board. Soon after, Kirill Kaprizov scored to get the Wild back to a four-goal lead. San Jose's comeback efforts continue in the third as they scored the next two from Evander Kane and Joachim Blichfeld to get within two. However, the comeback efforts were officially put to bed after Nick Bonino found the empty net to make it 6-3 in favor of the Wild.
The Sharks' last goal with about six minutes remaining was the most notable in this one since it was Joachim Blichfeld's first NHL goal. Timo Meier, Rudolfs Balcers, Tomas Hertl, and Nikolai Knyzhov each recorded an assist in the Sharks' loss to the Wild Saturday night.
Patrick Marleau was honored in his first home game after breaking the all-time games played record with a pregame ceremony and a tribute video led by Patty's longtime teammate Jumbo Joe Thornton. In addition, new logos commemorating the broken record were imprinted onto the ice at both ends, and every Sharks player wore Patty's heritage jerseys during warmups.
Martin Jones made five saves before being pulled for the eighth time this season, the most for any starting goalie in the NHL. In relief for Martin Jones, Josef Korenar stopped 15 of 17 shots against in the second and third periods. Regardless of his stretch of great performances before the trade deadline, Martin Jones is clearly not a starting-caliber goalie anymore and should not start another game for the Sharks this season, if not ever again. However, for some reason Bob Boughner doesn't see this and continues to override Jones and leave him out to dry during every game, which isn't working anymore. Their goaltending tandem should be Korenar and Melnichuk for the remainder of this season, no exceptions.
The last notable lineup change in this game from previous games is Greg Pateryn making his debut in Teal.
Despite a solid third period, the Sharks continue to struggle and play poorly time and time again. I don't know how much more I can take of this, but at the very least San Jose has increased its odds of drafting in the top five overall in this year's entry draft. The Sharks can't seem to win with its current roster right now, and if Doug Wilson doesn't make any significant changes to it this offseason, the team will get worse next season and he will lose his job as Sharks GM.
Anyway, the Sharks' next miniseries is Monday and Wednesday against the Coyotes, with both games starting at 7:30 pm PT. Monday's game will also be the first game at SAP Center in over a year that will be open to the general public, so hopefully this can motivate the Sharks to get out of their slump and perform better than they have been lately.
Sources: NBC Sports Bay Area/California, NHL App
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