Burns approaching rare air for a blue liner
He may be first to have 70-assist season in 25 years
SAN JOSE >> Brent Burns is putting together another historic season, albeit in a completely different way.
Burns won the 2017 Norris Trophy after he posted a pair of rare statistical seasons with his shot from the blue line. Now, he’s making another run at the trophy awarded to the NHL’s top defenseman as a setup man, attempting to become the first blue-liner to reach the 70-assist mark in 25 years.
“It shows you what a special athlete he is. This guy has it all,” Sharks coach Pete DeBoer said. “He’s always got that shot as a weapon. I think it’s the best in the league. But he also has that vision where he can look and find somebody back door that no one else sees.”
When Burns won the Norris Trophy two years ago, he led the league in shots on goal (320), serving as the centerpiece of the Sharks’ offensive attack. He also fell just one goal short of becoming the second defenseman since 198889 to net 30 goals in a year. During the Sharks’ Stanley Cup Final season in 2015-16, Burns put up 353 shots on goal, making him the only
defenseman in NHL history other than Bobby Orr or Ray Bourque to record 350-plus shots on net.
But as Burns continued to throw pucks into the blue paint at a nearly unparalleled pace, defenses started honing in on him more and more, forcing him to adjust his approach at the blue line. Now, when he draws the defense out to the right
point with the threat of his shot, he sends it back down low, creating more space for the Sharks’ big-bodied forwards. He’s also developed a skill for slinging pucks toward the sides of the net when shooting lanes are blocked, creating more opportunities for goals off redirects.
“That’s what great athletes do,” DeBoer said. “I compare it to a quarterback. If they’re taking away the deep ball, you’re throwing the short stuff. If it’s the other way around, you have that ability to adjust.”
Burns entered Monday night’s game against Las Vegas with 61 assists in 72 games, on pace to hit the 70-assist mark, a feat last achieved from the back end by Bourque and Sergei Zubov during the 199394 season. Erik Karlsson is the only defenseman who has picked up more than 65 assists in a season since that year. He had 66 during the 2015-16 season, a mark that Burns seems destined to eclipse over the next couple of weeks.
“I don’t even know who you’d include in the (Norris) conversation with him,” Joe Thornton said. “We’re spoiled seeing him every day because his skillset is so rare. I haven’t seen anyone else play like that on the back end in a long time.”
• Martin Jones will be earning his paycheck over the last three weeks of the season.
After the Sharks morning practice Monday, DeBoer said he’d be giving the net to his No. 1 goalie so long as the team has something to play for in the Western Conference playoff race. With that in mind, it’s fair to assume that Jones will play both ends of a back-to-back against the Los Angeles Kings and Anaheim Ducks in Southern California later this week.
The Sharks need to win the Pacific Division to avoid a first-round matchup with the Vegas Golden Knights and draw a wild-card opponent instead.
“He might have to play 90 percent of (our games) here. We’re still fighting, obviously, for first in the conference,” DeBoer said. “He’s going to play until we don’t have anything left to play for.”
• Vegas goalie Marc-André Fleury, the NHL’s shutout leader, missed Monday night’s game because of a day-to-day lower-body injury.
• DeBoer confirmed that Karlsson will be sidelined all this week with a groin injury that’s kept him out of the team’s last nine games. Karlsson skated for roughly 30 minutes prior to Monday’s practice, the third consecutive day in which he’s taken the ice.
• The Sharks recalled forward Lukas Radil and defenseman Jacob Middleton from the AHL Barracuda on Monday. Radil scored two goals and picked up four points in a pair of games with the Barracuda over the weekend.