The post Timo Meier era started on Tuesday
night as the Sharks hosted the Montreal Canadiens at SAP Center. The results
which warranted dealing Meier didn't change as the Sharks fell to Montreal 3-1.
The Sharks actually entered the 3rd period with a 1-0 lead, but the attention
to details bug nipped San Jose once again. Montreal scored a pair of goals in
less than 2 minutes to erase San Jose's lead and the Sharks dropped their 3rd
straight and 7th of 10 in the month of February.
With their leading
goal scorer now a distant memory, the Sharks will need to figure out who will
pick up the slack on the offensive side of the puck. No forward stepped up to
the plate in this one.
Jacob MacDonald scored the only goal of the
opening period 103 seconds into the contest. The recently acquired defenseman
was lurking in the high slot when a scoring chance by Evgeny Svechnikov kicked
off goaltender Jake Allen and out to MacDonald for a put-back chance. Allen
went left and MacDonald shot right for his 1st goal as a Shark and of the
season.
Montreal would outshoot San Jose 16-14 in the opening frame,
but that was partially fueled by a pair of power play chances.
San
Jose would put 16 more shots on Allen in the 2nd period, but could not get any
rubber past the Canadiens goaltender. Radim Simek just missed on a wraparound
chance in the final minute of the period.
Montreal finally solved
Kaapo Kahkonen on what looked like a routine shot 8 minutes into the 3rd
period. Kaiden Guhle fired a 60-foot shot from the high slot that beat the
sharks goaltender through the 5-hole.
The Canadiens grabbed the lead
1:52 later after a floating puck turned into a 2-on-1 break out of the Sharks
zone. Rem Pitlick carried the puck up ice with Jesse Ylonen on his right.
Pitlick made a bee line for the left post, then slid the puck up over to his
right after Kahkonen committed. Mario Ferraro was even with Ylonen save the
last three strides, where the Canadians forwarded got the extra step and tapped
home Pitlick's feed.
San Jose made a last ditch effort to bag the
equalizer by pulling Kahkonen late, but the enabled Christian Dvorak to pad his
personal stats with an empty net goal.
San Jose will get back on the
saddle on Thursday as the St Louis Blues come calling. The Blues have declared
themselves sellers after trading Ryan O'Reilly and Vladimir Tarasenko.
Game Notes: * Newly acquired players Fabian Zetterlund and
Andreas Johnsson made their debuts for San Jose. Zetterlund will wear #20 and
Johnsson #18.
* Radim Simek returned to the lineup after coming off
the injured reserve. The defenseman was sidelined with concussion issues since
January 6th and missed 21 games.
* Tomas Hertl's scoring woes
continued. The Czech forward has only scored twice in the last 18 games. The
last came off an empty net situation. Hertl has only scored 15 goals total this
season.
* With shot leader Timo Meier now gone, Erik Karlsson stepped
up and led the Sharks with 6 shots on goal in the game. Mikey Eyssimont added 5
shots to the Sharks 39 shot total.
* Kaapo Kahkonen deserved a better
result. He would be credited with his 18 loss of the season, even though he
made 29 saves.
