Sharks’ Marleau on verge of scoring 500th career goal

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Patrick Marleau is closing in on the 500 career goal milestone the same way he has played the rest of his 19 years in the NHL: with alarming speed.

With six goals in his past four games for the San Jose Sharks, Marleau has moved within one goal of becoming the 45th player to reach the 500-goal mark in his career. Only 17 members of the 500-goal club reached the mark with their original team like Marleau can do. He gets his next chance on Thursday night when the Sharks visit Rogers Arena to face the Canucks.

“It feels good,” Marleau said. “It’s one of those things you just can’t help but be asked questions about it or talk about. Just the way the team is playing right now is a bonus.”

Marleau has carried the Sharks the past few games with a four-goal third-period outburst at Colorado last week followed by another game-winning goal the next night in Winnipeg and then the first goal in San Jose’s first game back from the all-star break, a 3-1 win over Chicago on Tuesday night.

The 37-year-old Marleau is second on the Sharks with 18 goals and is on pace for his most goals since 201314. Coach Peter DeBoer said this is the best play he has seen from Marleau in his two years in San Jose.

“He’s an incredible athlete,” DeBoer said.

After getting off to a slow start to the season when he played mostly on the third line, Marleau’s play picked up when he was moved to the top line alongside Joe Thornton and Joe Pavelski in November after Tomas Hertl went down with a knee injury.

Then Marleau moved back to the second line where he reunited with centre Logan Couture and Mikkel Boedker, leading to the latest resurgence.

Marleau has 1,063 career points, two Olympic gold medals and a consecutive games played streak of 593.