Sharks hold Red Wings, Pacific rivals at bay
Fast start helps power San Jose past Red Wings 5-3 to maintain hold on second place
SAN JOSE >> On a night where the Sharks needed a win to stay above the pack in the Pacific Division, the team managed to fend off the Los Angeles Kings and gain two points on the Anaheim Ducks by completing their six-game homestand with a 4-2 record.
Clinging to a one-point lead over the Ducks and a two-point
edge over the Kings, the Sharks handed the Detroit Red Wings their seventh consecutive loss Monday by picking up a 5-3 win at SAP Center on a night where all three California teams were in action. The Ducks, who entered the night in third place, dropped out of a playoff spot by losing to the St. Louis Blues. The Kings moved into third place by beating the Vancouver Canucks.
A loss combined with wins by the Ducks and Kings would have bumped the Sharks into a wildcard spot.
“We’ve got to keep trying to build that ( lead in the standings),” captain Joe Pavelski said. “You know how hard you’ve worked to get a couple points ahead. You can’t expect to let that go and then climb back.”
The Sharks stayed ahead of the fray by getting goals from three of their four lines.
The top line opened the scoring at 10:55 of the first when Jones Donskoi recorded just his third goal in. 26 games on a Sharks rush play. Evander Kane, who’s earned six points in six games with the Sharks, set Donskoi up with a shot into a wide-open net after he received a cross-ice pass from Joe Pavelski, forcing an overcommitment
from goalie JimmyHoward.
The fourth line scored 1:44 later when Eric Fehr gave the Sharks a 2-1 lead by scoring his first goal with the team. Fehr, who joined the Sharks in a trade with the TorontoMaple Leafs on Feb. 20, recorded his first NHL tally since Jan. 18, 2017 by redirecting a point shot from Brenden Dillon on a delayed Red Wings penalty.
After spending all but four games this season in the minor leagues before joining the Sharks, Fehr couldn’t even remember his last NHL goal.
“Sadly, I don’t,” he said. “I’ll remember this one. It’s always nice to get your first with a team.”
The veteran center, who’s won 58.9 percent of his draws with the Sharks,
has closed the revolving door at fourth line center after Ryan Carpenter, Barclay Goodrow, Joel Ward and Danny O’Regan failed to lock down the job in earlier in the season, compromising the team’s four line attack.
“He’s solidified that fourth line spot,” Pavelski said. “He’s giving us some good-hard minutes on the PK, forechecking, holding onto pucks.”
Kevin Labanc gave the Sharks goals from three lines when he made it a
3-1 game at 1:39 of the second, poking the puck in between goalie Jimmy Howard’s pads in a scrum after Chris Tierney put a backhanded shot into the crease on a half-breakaway. The goal was Labanc’s second in 18 games.
Timo Meier, who earned the secondary assist on Labanc’s goal, picked up his second point of the game by scoring the game winner on the power play at 5:12 of the third. Meier recorded his 18th by redirecting a Mikkel Boedker shot in the slot. Dylan DeMelo earned the secondary assist, his second of the game, giving him seven points on the homestand.
“He hasn’t had it easy here. He hasn’t been handed anything,” head coach Pete DeBoer said. “He just keeps hanging around, getting the job done and he’s become a big part of our group.
Meier’s goal was the
Sharks second with the man advantage in their last 35 tries over a 15-game span. Both goals have been scored by the second unit.
The Red Wings opened the scoring at 5:01 when Henrik Zetterberg fed the puck to Trevor Daley in the slot and he beat goalie Martin Jones with a shot to his glove side. Gustav Nyquist scored the Red Wings second goal at 5:05 of the second, and Zetterberg cut the Sharks lead to 4-3 just 41 seconds afterMeier’s gamewinning goal, punching in a pass from Nyquist from the doorstep.
The Sharks went 2 for 2 on the penalty kill, completing the homestand with perfect grades by going 8 for 8. The NHL’s top-ranked penalty kill shifted the momentum of the game by killing off a tripping penalty to Barclay Goodrow just 3:30 after the Red Wings scored the opening goal.
Donskoi tied the game less than twominutes later.
“That’s when our game started to come,” Pavelski said. “That was some of the talk when it happened: if we get this kill, we can get a little momentum going. The game was already 1-0 at that point, so that was huge for us.”