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Wild win over
Wild
Sharks hang on for 6-5 win after taking 4-0
lead
The Sharks welcomed an old friend back to the SAP
Center on Thursday night. Former goaltender Alex Stalock returned to SAP and
was given the opportunity to start against his former team. The Sharks were
terrible hosts as they put four pucks past him in the 1st period in a gut punch
20 minutes. San Jose would go on to score 6 goals in the game, but they allowed
the gritty Wild to work their way back into the game, scoring 3 goals in the
3rd period to draw within a single goal, setting up a crazy finish. The Sharks
would hang on to win their second straight game, beating the Wild 6-5.
The fantastic start was overshadowed by a horrific 3rd period, which was a
reminder of the defensive holes that still plague the Sharks. Things looked
rosy for 40 minutes, but the absence of finish will either serve as a valuable
lesson that the younger players will build on, or an omen of what horrors still
await the Sharks in a season that is less than a quarter complete.
San
Jose jumped out to a quick lead when Logan Couture punched home an Evander Kane
feed while parked on the Wild doorstep. Kane made the feed from the right
corner as Couture slipped underneath past two Minnesota defenders. Former
Sharks goaltender Alex Stalock squared to the puck, but Couture slipped the
puck past his old teammate stick side.
Timo Meier pushed the lead to
2-0 at 5:55 when he gathered a Tomas Hertl feed at the blueline before skating
to the left circle and uncorking a shot that beat Stalock glove side. Stalock
was squared to the shooter, but his glove looked slow to react to the shot that
tucked inside the right post for his 4th goal of the season.
Marcus
Sorensen made it a 3-0 game with 3:20 left in the period when he got a stick
blade on a Patrick Marleau feed in the slot, changing the attack angle of the
puck so that it crept to the left of Stalock. The goal was Sorensen's 3rd of
the season.
Radim Simek got in on the scoring at 18:32 when he stepped
into a Tomas Hertl drop pass in the high slot to beat Stalock for his 1st goal
of the season. It's been a long road back for the Sharks defenseman who was
playing in only his second game since returning from knee surgery last year.
Wild head coach Bruce Boudreau tried to light a fire under his team by
pulling Stalock to start the 2nd period, inserting Devin Dubnyk in net.
Minnesota got on the board at 15:51 of the 2nd period after beating
Brendan Dillon to a loose puck out in front of the Sharks net. Defenseman Mario
Ferraro had defensive responsibility on Kunin, but Mat Dumba clipped his skate,
with a trip that went uncalled. Kunin swooped to the puck and lifted a shot
past Martin Jones.
The two teams would score two goals each in that
last 4:09 of the period to light up the scoreboard.
The Sharks would
score a pair of power play goals, that were split by Eric Staal's 6th goal of
the season. Tomas Hertl bagged his 6th of the year at 17:04 after Staal was
sent off for high sticking. The Sharks forward was floating in the slot when an
Logan Couture attempt hit a Wild defender. The puck kicked right to Hertl who
sent a low shot past Dubnyk for the 5-1 lead.
The Wild cut the Sharks
to three goals one again when Staal deflected a Ryan Hartman shot while he sat
parked in the slot. Hartman whipped the puck to the area in front of the net
from the right point, but Staal got a stick blade on the shot, redirecting it
down to the ice where it skipped past Jones.
Jordan Greenway put the
Sharks back on the power play with 55 seconds left in the period when he tossed
a puck over the glass from his own zone. The Sharks took all of 10 seconds on
the power play to put a 6th puck across the goal line. Couture spotted Evander
Kane positioned on the left post, so he sent a long diagonal pass from the
right dot to the off post. Kane easily tapped home the feed for his 9th tally
of the season.
Brad Hunt made it a 6-3 game at 8:07 of the 3rd
period, slipping a one-time chance from in tight after Kunin fed him the puck
from the end boards. Hunt was in the near the bottom of the right circle and
put his shot between Jones' pads for his 5th goal of the season.
Minnesota scored 1:14 later when Ryan Donato fired a shot from the high slot,
beating Jones for his 1st tally of the year.
Things turned chippy with
just under 10 minutes remaining in regulation when Evander Kane slashed Hartman
as the two were engaged along the side boards. Harman took a whack at Kane,
catching him in the back of the knee, buckling the forward. Kane had to hobble
to the locker room after a stoppage, but both earned penalties. Hartman was
assessed slashing major and was tossed from the game.
Minnesota
immediately took another penalty too many men, which setup some 5-on-3 power
play time, but the Sharks couldn't convert.
Jason Zucker served
Hartman's time in the box, which may have motivated him a bit. As soon as he
stepped back on the ice, he and Matt Zuccarello skated up ice, working the puck
around Joe Thornton. Zucker carried the puck up the left side before slipping a
shot past Jones to cut the Sharks lead to a lone goal with 4:35 remaining in
regulation.
Jones made the save of the game when Zach Parise had him
dead to rights, but the Sharks netminder was able to pin his skate to the left
post as the Wild captain took two whacks at trying to punch it home.
The last minute was a wild flurry of shot attempts that the Sharks somehow
managed to survive. Barely.
Game Notes:
* Logan Couture
recorded 4 points in the game with a goal and 3 assists.
* Dylan
Gambrell, Erik Karlsson and Noah Gregor were the only skaters who did not
record a shot on goal. San Jose threw 31 combined shots at Alex Stalock and
Devan Dubnyk.
* In addition to Couture's big scoring night, four other
Sharks had multi-point nights. Evander Kane, Marcus Sorensen and Timo Meier all
had a goal and an assist. Tomas Hertl had a goal and two assists.
*
Brendan Dillon recorded a -4 on a night where his team scored 6 goals. The
defensive numbers weren't all bad. Marc-Edouard Vlasic had a decent game, and
recorded a +3.
* Erik Staal led Minnesota with a goal and 2 assists.
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1 |
2 |
3 |
T |
| MIN |
0 |
2 |
3 |
5 |
| SJ |
4 |
2 |
0 |
6 |
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| 1st period - 1, SJ,
Couture 2 (Kane, Sorensen), 0:52. 2, SJ, Meier 4 (Hertl, E. Karlsson), 5:55. 3,
SJ, Sorensen 3 (Marleau, Couture), 16:40. 4, SJ, Simek 1 (Hertl, Meier), 18:32.
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| 2nd period - 5, MIN,
Kunin 3 (Eriksson Ek), 15:51. 6, SJ, Hertl 6 (Couture, Burns), 17:04, (pp). 7,
MIN, Staal 6 (Hartman), 17:59. 8, SJ, Kane 9 (Couture, Burns), 19:15, (pp).
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| 3rd period - 9, MIN,
Hunt 5 (Kunin), 8:07. 10, MIN, Donato 1 (Staal), 9:21. 11, MIN, Zucker 5
(Zuccarello, Staal), 15:25. |
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| 1st period - Gambrell,
SJ (slashing), 11:42; GReenway, MIN (roughing), 19:54; Burns, SJ (roughing),
19:54. |
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| 2nd period - Hartman,
MIN (roughing), 5:09; Meier, SJ (roughing), 5:09; Dillon, SJ (slashing), 7:25;
Meier, SJ (holding), 13:06; Dumba, MIN (fighting major), 14:06; Gambrell, SJ
(fighting major), 14:06; Greenway, MIN (delay of game - puck over glass),
19:05. |
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| 3rd period - Hartman,
MIN (slashing major), 10:09; Kane, SJ (cross checking), 10:09; Bench, MIN (too
many men), 10:43. |
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Shots |
Saves |
| MIN - Stalock |
12 |
8 |
| MIN - Dubnyk |
19 |
17 |
| SJ - Jones |
26 |
21 |
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1 |
2 |
3 |
T |
| MIN |
10 |
10 |
6 |
26 |
| SJ |
12 |
7 |
12 |
31 |
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| Referees: Rehman,
Schlenker. Linesmen: Suchanek, Gawryletz. |
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