Boughner’s patience wears thin following loss
The San Jose Sharks can’t afford to give away games and fritter away points in this shortened season, even if they were considered to be one of the West Division’s top teams.
But that’s how it played out Monday night against the St. Louis Blues, as the Sharks coughed up a two-goal lead after
the first period and a onegoal lead in the second in what became a 5-4 loss at Enterprise Center.
Sharks coach Bob Boughner wants to have patience with a team that has not played since March, is getting used to a new system and was dressing five players Monday who are either in their first or second season of North American professional hockey. But it’s tough when in his view, a more positive outcome that would have given his team a boost of confidence was within reach.
“This game was a winnable game for us,” Boughner said.
“We scored four on the road. We won the special teams and that should be a recipe for at least a point. I can think of three goals off the top of my head that they came off our sticks.
“Just high-percentage, really not smart hockey plays, and they go down and they score, and that’s difference. St. Louis is a good team. You can’t give them anything, let alone (goals
on) bad decisions and bad hockey-sense plays.”
After not playing a game the past 10 months or having a preseason to help work out the kinks, the Sharks fully expected some mistakes to happen in the early part of this season.
But Jordan Kyrou’s third period goal, which became the game-winner, was inexcusable, so much so that Boughner all but promised more lineup changes ahead of Wednesday’s rematch with the Blues.
At the midway point of the third period, the Sharks cleared the puck out of the zone but not past the red
line. Still, four players — Fredrik Handemark, Matt Nieto, Noah Gregor and Radim Simek — headed off for a change.
The Blues quickly charged into the zone, and after taking a pass from Colton Parayko, Kyrou, with time and space,
made a move in front of rookie defenseman Nikolai Knyzhov, used him as a screen and fired a wrist shot past Sharks goalie Devan Dubnyk for a 5-4 St. Louis lead with 9:32 left in regulation.
Boughner said the Sharks have harped on these kinds of details since the start of the season, and even went over them again before Monday’s game.
“You can’t have all three guys change at once. The left winger’s got to hold there,” Boughner said. “You know, you can only do so much talking and then after a while you’ve just got to change personnel to the guys that want to do it right. And that’s what’s going on right now.”