If these Sharks proved anything Thursday night, it’s that they
know how to make a postseason entrance. Game 1 of their series
against the Los Angeles Kings was just 28 seconds old when Dany
Heatley scored on a rebound of a Ryane Clowe shot.
SAN JOSE
If these Sharks proved anything Thursday night, it’s that they know how to make a postseason entrance. Game 1 of their series against the Los Angeles Kings was just 28 seconds old when Dany Heatley scored on a rebound of a Ryane Clowe shot.
It looked easy. It was easy. But it got a lot more difficult from there. By the end of the game they had proved something else: They need to be better than they were.
Did we mention the Sharks won, 3-2 in overtime? It’s called getting away with one.
Oh, they weren’t uniformly substandard after Heatley’s opening-shift goal. They rode the momentum of that score throughout the period, outshooting the Kings, 14-3. And outhitting, out-skating and out-jumping the Kings as well.
Even the much-discussed San Jose penalty kill enjoyed some high times. The Sharks effortlessly killed two penalties in the first period, holding the Kings shot-less on both.
Then came the turning point — the first intermission.
It was a different game after that. The Kings began to match the Sharks’ intensity. But then, you expected that would happen at some point. What you didn’t necessarily expect was the time and space the Sharks began allowing the visitors. Or the parade of breakdowns. Or the way simple passes missed their mark.
Speaking of miscues, one cost the Sharks the lead. Six minutes into the second period, Niclas Wallin carelessly sent a clearing pass fluttering into the stands for an automatic delay of game penalty.
Oddly enough, it seemed the Sharks gained momentum from the mistake. For the L.A. power play had barely begun when Patrick Marleau raced up ice for a short-handed chance. His shot whistled high.
Near the end of the power play, Logan Couture found himself with a chance to make an offensive push. This time two teammates — Torrey Mitchell and Marc-Edouard Vlasic — came with him. But the promising play turned disastrous when Couture’s wide shot rimmed around behind the Kings net and came speeding to Justin Williams, who scooped it up and led a 3-on-1 the other way against Jason Demers, the only Sharks player to have held his position in the defensive end.
Williams drew San Jose goalie Antti Niemi to the right, then slipped a pass to the left. Dustin Brown found himself staring at acres of empty net. He didn’t miss.
“The penalty kill was doing a pretty good job,” Sharks coach Todd McLellan said. “Then all of a sudden we got scored on. That put us back on our heels a little bit.”
Say this for Couture — he didn’t hang his head. A few minutes later, he came flying up the left-wing side. He squeezed past a rub-out attempt by defenseman Drew Doughty, leaving Doughty sprawled on the ice. Couture then squeezed a wrist shot past the stick of Jonathan Quick for a 2-1 lead.
“For Logan to come back like that was important for him as an individual as it was for us as a team,” McLellan said.
But it didn’t change the tenor of the game. In fairness, San Jose was short one defenseman, Ian White having left the game in the first period after being launched face-first into the glass by the Kings’ Jarret Stoll.
It also bears noting that the game, extremely physical in the early going, often bogged down into an inelegant struggle on both sides. Players more intent on hitting than controlling the puck pinwheeled out of control. More than a few players fell like holiday season revelers on an outdoor rink, suggesting issues with the ice.
But the tying goal was the direct result of another Sharks flub. Dan Boyle tried to shovel the puck behind the San Jose net. As it happened, that’s where Douglas Murray was standing. Boyle and Murray engaged in a two-defenseman pileup, and the puck dribbled to the Kings’ Williams. You could almost see the thought balloon above his head — “Hey, thanks!” — as he tucked it past a startled Niemi.
The third period was scoreless, and the Sharks looked tanked in overtime. They gave the Kings some juicy scoring chances, none more succulent than Brad Richardson’s look at an open net. But Richardson couldn’t redirect the puck, and it slid harmlessly past the goal line.
Joe Pavelski’s game-winner 14:44 into overtime had to have come as a relief, maybe to both sides.
“We had our looks to win,” Kings coach Terry Murray said. “We didn’t (convert). But we come away with a good feeling.”
As did the Sharks. They dodged a bullet.
— Column by Gary Peterson, Contra Costa Times
