The Sharks have seen enough of the state of
Florida. After spending the last 4 days in the sunshine state, they are more
than happy to not spend any more time in the land of citrus and theme parks.
Their 2-game strip to the state resulted in a pair of lopsided loses that
negated some of the positive vibes the team had built over the pervious two
weeks. The defending Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers gave the Sharks a
crash course in championship caliber hockey by beating the Sharks 3-1 at
Amerant Bank Arena.
San Jose has been out-scored 11-2 in the past 72
hours and have come back down to earth after winning 3 in a row. This one was
all Panthers. Period.
The horrors of Thursday night's 8-1 loss in
Tampa quickly jumped into the discussion when Matthew Tkachuk scored just 23
seconds into the game. With the puck entering the sharks zone for the first
time of the game, Sam Bennet fired a shot on Mackenzie Blackwood from the right
side. The puck bounced to the area near the right post, where Tkachuk was able
to put another shot on net. Blackwood stopped the follow up, but the puck
deflected into the air to the right of the Sharks goaltender. Tkchuk swatted it
out of the air an into the goal for his 9th tally of the season.
San
Jose did little to threaten Panthers goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky, putting a
paltry 5 shots on goal in the period. Bobrovsky only faced one quality scoring
chance in the frame as San Jose spent most of the period trying to exit their
own zone.
Blackwood kept the gap limited to a single goal early in the
2nd period when Aaron Ekblad had a wide open net to shoot out. The Sharks
netminder dove to his left with the glove extended wide open to snare Ekblad's
shot.
San Jose made a push at the 6 minute mark when a scrum in front
of the Panthers net ended with a Florida player plowing into Bobrovsky. Tkachuk
took exception and went after Alex Wennberg to draw a roughing penalty. The
Sharks would not convert, keeping the deficit in play.
Blackwood made
another highlight reel save on Sam Reinhardt with his left pad at the 8 minute
mark after the Panthers bounced a shot off the goaltender with a shot from the
slot.
Tkachuk would find the back of the net at the midway
mark after flipping a backhand shot from the bottom of the right circle that
hit Blackwood and flipped over the netminder's shoulder and into the goal.
One of the league's deadliest power play units was gifted an
opportunity to add to Florida's goal tally when Klim Kostin was called for a
phantom holding penalty at 12:39. The red hot Panthers special teams unit
promptly put a puck past Blackwood 38 seconds later when Aleksander Barkov
pumped a shot past Blackwood to make it a 3-0 game.
The Panthers were
awarded a 3rd power play on a missed call at 19:05 when Mikael Granlund was
called for high sticking Bennett. Replay clearly showed that Bennett was
clipped by a teammates stick.
The period would continue to serve as
penalty call training for referees Brian Pochmara and Cody Beach. The two would
combine to call 6 minor penalties in the period and 12 for the game.
The last was a Eetu Lustarainen tripping penalty that setup the Sharks 7th
power play of the night. San Jose elected to pull Blackwood for the 6-on-4
advantage. Tyler Toffoli would tip a Mikael Granlund shot to snap Bobrovsky's
shutout bid, but it would be too little, too late for the Sharks.
Game Notes: * Will Smith sustained an undisclosed upper body
injury in Tampa Bay on Thursday and was scratched on Saturday night.
*
San Jose dropped both games against the Panthers last season by scores of 3-1
and 5-3. Florida will visit SAP Center on January 25th.
* Matthew
Tkachuk has scored 29 points in 23 career games against San Jose.
*
Mackenzie Blackwood made 50 saves, facing 20 shots in each of the 2nd and 3rd
period. Not a lot of support for the netminder once again.
* Macklin
Celebrini led the sharks with 5 sots on goal. Gustav Forsling (7), Aleksander
Barkov (6) and Matthew Tkachuk (6) combined for 19 shots.
