Sharks keep slim playoff hopes alive; Niemi bounces back in goal in 4-1 win over Maple Leafs.
TORONTO — If the Sharks had lost to the lowly Toronto Maple Leafs on Thursday night, their dim hopes for a late-season surge to the playoffs would have been, well, whatever category is below flickering.
But they didn’t. San Jose came through with its strongest offensive showing in more than two weeks, got solid bounce-back goaltending from Antti Niemi and skated off with a 4-1 victory.
The Sharks probably can reach the postseason even if they drop one or two more games, but losing to the Maple Leafs likely would have been devastating. Still, don’t suggest that the victory was any less significant because of the opponent, which now has only one win in its past
eight games.
“They’re playing just to play so they’re going to be loose, they’re going to play hard. We weren’t looking past this game by any means,” forward Joe Pavelski said. “It was important that the guys were as focused as they were and handled the situation well.”
Tomas Hertl, Logan Couture, Melker Karlsson and Tommy Wingels scored for the Sharks, and Leafs defenseman Jake Gardiner’s shot was the only one to get past Niemi, who made 27 saves two days after being yanked in the first period of a 5-2 loss at Winnipeg.
The win narrowed the gap between the Sharks and third place in the Pacific Division, which carries an automatic playoff berth, from six points to five. But San Jose gained no ground in the wild-card competition and remains six behind in that race.
The Sharks got on the board at 7:02 of the first period when Chris Tierney sent the puck to Hertl slicing through the slot for a quick redirect that Leafs goalie Jonathan Bernier had no chance to stop.
“I thought I had some time and I saw him going to the net, so I thought I’d just get it to him and he made a great play,” said Tierney, who was centering the second line for the first time this season after coach Todd McLellan shuffled his forwards.
Tierney, who centered Hertl and Patrick Marleau, ended up with a seasonhigh 19:06 in ice time, while Couture, who was dropped to the third line, had 15:40 skating between Wingels and Matt Nieto.
McLellan said before the game he was seeking improvement on both ends of the ice after the Sharks allowed 11 goals in the previous two games. And though each of the new lines produced a goal, it was their play in their own zone that pleased him most.
“They were good defensively,” the coach said. “The goals, we hoped would come over time, but it was giving up five a night ... we weren’t going to win that way.”
The Sharks broke it open in the second period.
A power-play goal by Couture — his first of any kind in six games — gave San Jose a 2-0 lead at 2:06, but Toronto narrowed the gap again at 8:54 when defenseman Gardiner’s shot through traffic floated over Niemi’s shoulder into the far top corner.
But San Jose restored the lead to two goals when Karlsson slipped into some open space to take a Joe Thornton pass — a milestone 900th assist — and fired the puck past Bernier at 10:19. And Wingels deflected a shot by Nieto with just six seconds left before the second intermission to make it 4-1.
The victory evened the Sharks record at 1-1 on their seven-game trip that continues with a Saturday night game against the Montreal Canadiens. But the Sharks know many more need to follow with only 11 games left in the season.
“Now we need to build on this win,” Couture said. We;’re going into a tough building to win in Saturday. It’s going to be an exciting game for us. Build off this one, move forward.”