Sharks throttle Vancouver in 3-1 win at HP Pavilion
SAN JOSE – Two nights after falling flat against the Dallas Stars 3-0, the San Jose Sharks regrouped to throttle the Vancouver Canucks 3-1 in front of 15,017 NHL fans Thursday at HP Pavilion.
The victory pushed the Pacific Division-leading Sharks to a seven-point bulge over three clubs, Phoenix, Los Angeles and Dallas. San Jose visits the surging Colorado Avalanche Saturday night.
“Actually, we might have needed that game against Dallas to snap us back to reality,” said San Jose coach Ron Wilson about the team’s one-night slump.
“It was like our normal game returned. We had compassion, some jump. It was a pretty courageous effort on our part.”
After winning just once in the first 10 games, San Jose has rebounded to fashion a 19-11-11-4 record with 37 games to play before Stanley Cup Playoff assignments are made.
“We’ve been pretty solid,” said Wilson about the distance built by the Sharks in the division standings. “Other teams have come on hard times.”
Alyn McCauley, who pocketed his 11th goal of the campaign 3:24 into the third period to give San Jose a 3-0 lead, noted that the Dallas game effort made an impression on the players in looking to the Vancouver game.
“That Dallas performance was fresh in our minds. We didn’t want the same thing to happen. It was conscious thing.”
The Sharks opened with a 17-6 edge in shots on net in the first period while taking a 2-0 lead.
San Jose went ahead 1-0 11:46 into play when Alexander Korolyuk netted a wrap-around to foil goalie Dan Cloutier. McCauley began the play with a pass to the left boards to Korolyuk. The winger, celebrating his 28th birthday, raced from the red line, around the left flank, past defenseman Bryan Allen to score his sixth goal.
Jonathan Cheechoo collected his 13th goal 59 seconds later for a 2-0 margin. Cheechoo dumped the puck into the right corner of the Canuck zone, then skated to the slot. Mike Ricci’s feed from the back boards dribbled to Cheechoo for the one-timer from 15 feet out.
Korolyuk ignited the team’s third goal with a clearing play that sent the puck toward the Vancouver zone. As Cloutier chased down the puck ahead of both Korolyuk and Nils Ekman, the puck ended up bounding off Korokyuk’s skate and toward the left boards. McCauley corraled the puck and beat Cloutier from a tough angle.
Markus Naslund scored his 25th goal of the season 19 seconds ater by stuffing home the rebound of a shot by Canuck rookie Jason King.
Ekman equaled his career best in points (20) with an assist on the McCauley goal.
Evgeni Nabokov made 34 shots while earning his 11th win of the season, 101 for his career.
The Sharks open a four-game schedule next week with a Monday home date with Detroit at 5 p.m.