A three-goal second period and significant contributions from their defense, depth scoring, and goaltending led the Sharks to a huge 4-1 victory over the Florida Panthers.
Will Smith gets the Sharks on the board early in the second period with his 14th goal of the season and goals in consecutive games since his return from injury. Timothy Liljegren and Alex Wennberg assisted on the opening goal by Smith. Team Teal then added two more goals early in the second period, more specifically from their defense. The Sharks’ second goal of this contest was scored by Vincent Desharnais for his first of the season and second of his NHL career in his return from injury, assisted by Igor Chernyshov and Michael Misa. It’s been a great return for Desharnais, as he laid a few solid body checks in this game as well. Their third goal of the contest was Mario Ferraro’s fourth goal of the season, assisted by Barclay Goodrow and Igor Chernyshov.
The Panthers got on the board less than a minute into the third period on a goal from Eetu Luostarinen. Later in the third period, a phenomenon that has not occurred in a hockey game in a long time went down, specifically a goalie fight between Alex Nedeljkovic and Sergei Bobrovsky stemming from a scrum between several skaters. This was certainly unusual to see, as Nedeljkovic earned the decision, and both Nedeljkovic and Bobrovsky received five minutes each for fighting and two minutes each for leaving the crease. The last time a Sharks goalie was involved in a fight was back in 1999. With under three minutes remaining in this contest, the Sharks put an exclamation point on this one with an empty-netter for Barclay Goodrow's fourth goal of the season.
Besides his fight with Sergei Bobrovsky, Alex Nedeljkovic was absolutely fantastic in the crease for the Sharks, compiling 35 saves on 36 shots against. More on the recent Sharks transactions prior to this game, especially the Kiefer Sherwood trade, were discussed in the previous post.
Not only was this a massive win for the Sharks, but this game was absolutely epic and featured a bit of everything. It was great to see Vincent Desharnais make an immediate impact in his return from injury, and Alex Nedeljkovic had an excellent and memorable performance tonight in Sunrise. What is equally as impressive is that this is the first time the Sharks swept the defending Stanley Cup champions in a season series and the Sharks' first win this season in which Macklin Celebrini was held off the scoresheet. With this win and the Kraken's 6-3 loss to the Penguins earlier today, the Sharks now have 53 points, one more than they have had all of last season, and move into third place in the Pacific Division. Team Teal closes out its current four-game road trip tomorrow in Tampa against the Lightning at 4 pm PT.
Sources: NBC Sports California, NHL App
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