Avalanche Bury Sharks 6-2; SJ has lost 4 of last 5 games

San Jose Sharks right wing Nick Merkley, right, attempts to take the puck down ice against Colorado Avalanche right wing Valeri Nichushkin at the Pepsi Center in Denver on Sat Nov 13, 2021 (AP News photo)

By Mary Walsh

The San Jose Sharks fell 6-2 to the Colorado Avalanche in Denver Saturday. Devon Toews, Nazem Kadri, Alex Newhook, Logan O’Connor, Andre Burakovsky and Samuel Girard scored for Colorado. Darcy Kuemper made 28 saves for the win. Logan Couture and Alexander Barabanov scored for San Jose, and Adin Hill made 25 saves in the loss.

With this loss, the Sharks fell out of a playoff spot for the first time in this young season. Although they had their veterans back from COVID-19 protocol, having to kill four penalties in the first period hurt the team.

After the game, Sharks Head Coach Bob Boughner said: “You start putting your big boys out there, killing penalties and you lose the flow of your game and we could never get it back.” Boughner mentioned mishandled pucks and bad changes, then summarized: “We started doing things that were uncharacteristic. And there were some guys who looked like they hadn’t played in a long time.”

Sharks forward Tomas Hertl mentioned defensive zone turnovers and how they lead to penalties when tired skaters are trapped in their own zone. In terms of offense, he said: “We need everybody to step it up because we are a team, you know, with 20 guys and we are no team with one line. So today wasn’t good enough.”

Logan Couture gave the Sharks the lead early in the first. While Timo Meier created a screen, Couture’s one-timer from the wing beat Kuemper on the near side. Assists went to Mario Ferraro and Meier.

Devon Toews tied the game at 10:10 wth a power play goal. His shot went by a couple of skaters in the slot and under Adin Hill. Assists went to Samuel Girard and Nazem Kadri.

Nazem Kadri gave the Avalanche the lead just a few minutes later. Valeri Nichushkin’s pass found Kadri breaking away. Kadri drew Hill to the front of the blue paint before slipping the puck around behind the goaltender. Assists went to Nichushkin and Erik Johnson.

The Sharks had to kill four penalties in the first period. In all, their penalty kill gave up six shots and one goal. Despite the penalties, the Sharks still got 12 shots on goal to the Avalanche’s ten. In the face-off circle, the Sharks won 46% of the draws.

Alex Newhook made it 3-1 with his first NHL goal, at 13:55 of the second period. Sam Girard made a pass form the red line to Newhook on the far side of the net, and Newhook shot it past a spawling Hill. Assists went to Girard and Jayson Megna.

Logan O’Connor added a short-handed goal for the Avalanche a couple of minutes later. O’Connor broke away, evading Brent Burns and Timoe Meier before scoring with a backhand. Assists went to Darren Helm and Erik Johnson.

The Avalanche outshot the Sharks 11-8, and won 53% of the face-offs. The Sharks penalty kill allowed two shots. The Sharks power play got one shot on goal.

Alexander Barabanov scored a power play goal for the Sharks at 9:02 of the third period. Tomas Hertl made a shot pass form the boards to Barabanov, who was ready to take a shot into the far side. Jasper Weatherby was right in front of Kuemper so the goalie didn’t see the shot. Assists went to Tomas Hert and Erik Karlsson.

Andre Burakovsky killed any momentum from the power play goal with a goal a little more than a minute later. Samuel Girard took a slap shot from just above the face-off circle, and hit Gabriel Landeskog. As Landeskog fell, the rebound went right to Buraskovky for the scoring shot. Assists went to Landeskog and Girard.

Samuel Girard scored Colorado’s sixth of the night at 16:37, into an empty net. Nazem Kadri got the assist.

For the game, the Sharks had a face-off win percentage of 52, and 30 shots to the Avalanche’s 31.

The Sharks’ next game will be Tuesday in St. Paul against the Minnesota Wild at 6:00 PM PT.

Avalanche Bury Sharks in 7-3 Win

The Colorado Avalanche’s center Nathan MacKinnon (29) gets past the San Jose Sharks Mario Ferraro (38) to put the puck on net and Sharks goaltender Martin Jones (1) in the first period of Tue Jan 26, 2021 game at the Ball Center in Denver (AP News photo)

By Mary Walsh

The San Jose Sharks fell 7-3 to the high-powered Colorado Avalanche on Tuesday. The Avalanche goals were scored by Valeri Nichushkin, Brandon Saad (2), Joonas Donskoi, Mikko Rantanen, Devon Toews and Samuel Girard. Their goaltender, Philipp Grubauer, made 27 saves for the win. Sharks goals came from Noah Gregor, Ryan Donato and Logan Couture. Martin Jones made 14 saves on 19 shots before being replaced by Devan Dubnyk, who made 21 saves for San Jose.

Sharks Head Coach Bob Boughner described the moment he thought the game really started to unravel for his team:

“The most disappointing thing for me was, you know, okay it’s three-one after the first period, we had a good eight, nine minutes and we’re still in the hockey game and then we start on the power play. We turn one over, they go down and get a breakaway. Our next unit comes on, turns one over, it’s in the back of our net, it’s four one. Obviously, that’s when the game opens up a bit and we paid the price for it. You can’t open up against these guys and you can’t mis-manage pucks and that’s exactly what we did.”

Sharks defenseman Erik Karlsson said:

“They played a good game today and we did not. I think we started okay but we still defended a lot, even though we got the first goal. I don’t think that was anything we really created. We got a good puck bounce. I think that once they started rolling, we became a little passive and we gave them a little too much room and, you know, we started doubting ourselves a bit. And that’s probably why the game ran away from us against a good team like this.”

The Sharks scored first, a double-tap from Ryan Donato at 10:39. He brought the puck up from the goal line and tried to shoot it through two defenders but it hit a couple of legs. He found it as it bounced and nudged it in for his third of the season. Assists went to Kevin Labanc and Logan Couture.

Colorado tied it up at 16:15. Valeri Nichushkin carried the puck down around behind the net and then sent it back to the blue line for a shot by Erik Johnson. Joonas Donskoi skated across in front of Martin Jones just as the shot came in and the puck hit him on the way in. Assists went to Johnson and Nichushkin.

The Avalanche took the lead less that a minute later. Cale Makar put the puck into traffic in front of Martin Jones and Brandon Saad knocked it in. Assists went to Makar and Andre Burakovsky.

Piling it on, Colorado scored a power play goal in the final minute of play. Nikolai Knyzhov was in the box for hooking against Tyson Jost. The Sharks penalty kill held off the Colorado power play for almost a minute before Mikko Rantanen scored with a hard shot from above the face-off circle. Assists went to Nathan MacKinnon and Makar.

At the end of the first, Colorado led in shots 16-9 and the Sharks had a slight lead in face-off wins of 52%.

The Avalanche kept rolling. The Sharks had an early power play in the second period, but half way through it, Valeri Nichushkin snatched the puck in the neutral zone and took it the other way for a short-handed goal.

Samuel Girard scored a few minutes later with a shot through what looked like all available skaters on the ice. Assists went to Tyson Jost and Kiefer Sherwood.

Devan Dubnyk came in to relieve Martin Jones in the Sharks net. After the game, Bob Boughner said: “I think both goalies were left out to dry multiple times tonight. It’s tough to make a goalie evaluation, I think that, you know, some of the plays that they made through the seam, and we actually made some saves on it, they scored on I think it was the second or third one. But you can’t allow seam plays.”

The Sharks’ third line showed some jump and scored one at 7:44. Some quick passes got the puck to the net just as Noah Gregor got there to tuck it in with a backhand. Assists went to Dylan Gambrell and Timo Meier.

Near the 13:00 mark, Devan Dubnyk got tangled up with J.T. Compher. He took some time to recover but did not leave the game.

The Avalanche resumed scoring at 13:30 when Devon Toews scored Colorado’s sixth of the night. Towes took a shot from the blue line that did not go in. Toews took another shot, this time into an empty net while Dubnyk was tangled up with another Colorado forward. Assists went to Gabriel Landeskog and Cale Makar.

Brandon Saad scored his second of the night at 15:01. Johnson, Kadri and Saad entered the zone and got around everyone but Vlasic and in a brief two-on-one, scored the team’s seventh.

The Sharks were outshot in the second 13-6.

Logan Couture got one back for San Jose at 12:43 of the third period. Kevin Labanc made a cross-ice pass to Donato as they entered the zone with Couture between them. Donato moved it back to the middle as they closed on the net and Couture tipped it in. Assists went to Donato and Labanc.

The only stat that favored the Sharks Tuesday was their face-off win percentage, finishing with 53%.

The Sharks next play on Thursday at 6:00 PM PT, against the Avalanche in Colorado again.

Sharks Hold On To Win 4-3 Over Avs

Photo credit: @SanJoseSharks

By Mary Walsh

SAN JOSE — The San Jose took an early lead and then fended off the resurgent Colorado Avalanche for a 4-3 win at home Friday. Sharks goals came from Marcus Sorensen (2), Joe Pavelski and Timo Meier. Martin Jones made 22 saves for the win, while Semyon Varlamov made an impressive 36 saves for the losing team. The Avalanche got goals from Samuel Girard, Mikko Rantanen and Nikita Zadorov.

After the game, Sharks captain Joe Pavelski said:

We got a lot of pucks back and I think we were fairly hungry. We played a much harder game, much more complete game and, you know, we were rewarded for it. We got to play in the o-zone a little bit tonight.

The Sharks scored in the first five minutes of the first two periods. The first came from Marcus Sorensen, who received a well-timed pass from Brent Burns. Burns took a few seconds deciding where to send that pass as he held the puck along the boards. The opening was small, but Sorensen was there to shoot through traffic and into the net. Assists went to Burns and Joe Thornton.

The second came from Timo Meier at 2:35 of the second. Joe Pavelski got to the puck off a defensive zone faceoff and was just able to tip it over to Meier as Meier left the zone. Meier carried it through the neutral zone and then took a shot above the faceoff circle, using a Colorado defender as a screen. Pavelski got the assist.

The Avalanche got one back from the stick of Nikita Zadorov at 4:55 of the second. After winning control of the puck below the goal line, the Avalanche moved the puck back to the point and across, drawing defenders with it. Zadorov’s shot came from the blue line while Marc-Edouard Vlasic was trying to clear Matt Calvert out of Jones’s way. Jones didn’t see the shot coming until too late. Assists went to Gabriel Landeskog and Ian Cole.

With just 44 seconds left in the second, Sorensen scored his second of the game. The Avalanche were on their heels after a long, high-pressure shift from the Sharks’ top line of Couture, Pavelski and Meier. Not long after the line change, Kevin Labanc took a shot from almost at the blue line, but it hit a defender in front of Varlamov. Hertl was on hand to try again but his shot hit the post and the puck fell dead in the blue paint, behind the goaltender. Meier was right there for the third try and swept it over the line. Assists went to Hertl and Labanc.

The Sharks led on the shot clock in both the first (9-6) and second (18-7) periods. They also prevailed in the faceoff circle 55% of the time.

The Avalanche got a power play goal from Mikko Rantanen at 10:08 of the third. It was a strange goal that started with a shot from Alexander Kerfoot, which Vlasic got a stick on. The puck went off of Vlasic’s stick to hit Landeskog in the torso as he skated to the net. It bounced off of him and landed near Martin Jones, but Rantanen got to it before Jones could get a glove on it. Assists went to Landeskog and Kerfoot.

The Sharks took back their two-goal lead on a power play at 12:39 of the third. Kevin Labanc was above the faceoff circle, skating toward the net. He looked very much like he would shoot, but he passed at the last second, finding Pavelski across the ice with an open net. It was Pavelski’s 36th goal of the season and assists went to Labanc and Couture.

Colorado would not sit still for that and Samuel Girard got one back with a shot off the rush at 13:27. The shot went cleanly through quite a bit of traffic. Assists went to Landeskog and Nathan McKinnon.

Colorado pulled Varlamov in the final minutes, but the Sharks held them off.

The Sharks power play went 1/3, while the Avalanche power play went 1/2. Evander Kane and Erik Karlsson were both out of the lineup Friday.

The Sharks next play on Sunday at 7:00 PM PT in San Jose, against the Chicago Blackhawks.