Dell’s 2nd shutout an easy win
The Sharks don’t enjoy a lot of laughers these days. So they’ll savor Saturday night’s for a few minutes before they turn their attention to hosting Minnesota on Sunday.
Five skaters scored goals and Aaron Dell registered his second shutout of the season as San Jose beat the Ottawa Senators 5-0 at sold-out SAP Center.
“It’s not going to be like this every night. You hope it is, but it’s not. It was a nice win,” said Sharks defenseman MarcEdouard Vlasic, one of the host’s goal-scorers.
Joe Pavelski, Logan Couture, Melker Karlsson and Tomas Hertl joined Vlasic in the goal column and Dell turned aside 25 shots for his third career shutout. The Sharks, who have won consecutive games, handed the Senators their third shutout in four outings.
“He’s been great every time he goes in the net,” Vlasic said of Dell. “We have a lot of confidence in him, and he has confidence when he goes in.”
The Sharks had this one from the start. They registered the first nine shots of the game, didn’t surrender any rubber on net until past the midway point of the opening period and drew eight penalties.
The Sharks looked dangerous all night during 5-on-4, scoring two power-play goals, and
were yet again perfect on the penalty kill. All in all, it was as solid a win as the team has registered this season.
“We were really firing on all cylinders tonight,” Dell said.
Couture scored the only goal of an opening period the Sharks dominated while outshooting the Senators 16-6 in the process.
Couture’s 15th goal came at 12:55 when he capped a line rush by beating Ottawa Craig Anderson between the pads with a wrist shot from the left circle. Kevin Labanc fed Couture, who gained a step on Zach Smith, a forward trying to defend on the fly.
Couture added two assists for a three-point night. His last assist represented the 400th point of his career, all spent in San Jose.
“It’s nice to hit a milestone like that,” Couture said. “I’ve played with a lot of great players on the power play, which has been real good over the years.”
The Sharks opened some breathing room by scoring twice more in the second period. San Jose pressured but didn’t convert on an early-period power play, but five seconds after the 5-on-4 expired Vlasic found the back of the net for a 2-0 lead.
Rookie defenseman Tim Heed hit Vlasic with a cross-ice feed, and the veteran defenseman one-timed his third goal of the season past Anderson.
Pavelski scored his sixth goal of the season at 3:34 of the third period and Hertl added his sixth — both on the power play.