San Jose Sharks update

It’s long past time for an update on the San Jose Sharks, and wow are the guys kicking some ice hockey butt this season! What is amazing about the team’s success this year is how it has been done with many key players on the injured reserve list. Thankfully, the Olympic break allowed hurts to heal.

The Gold-medal winning Canadian team included Patrick Marleau and Marc-Eduoard Vlasic, who both returned with a boosted enthusiasm while Antti Niemi was a member of the bronze medal winning team Finland. Team USA didn’t win a medal, but Joe Pavelski gave a good performance.

Once the guys suited back up in the teal, they were joined by Raffi Torres, who had been out since the pre-season with an injury. Logan Couture also rejoined the roster after having surgery on his hand. The immediate impact of Raffi’s return showed when three of his initial four shots resulted in goals. Logan also began earning points with goals.

Prior to the Olympic break, the Sharks had been winning games, utilizing Taylor Doherty, John McCarthy, Matt Tennyson, Eriah Hayes, and Freddie Hamilton from Worcester. The minor league players each had the opportunity to get ice time, helping to keep the Sharks numbers up in the standings.

At the end of play, Friday, March 14^th, San Jose was tied with the Anaheim Ducks with 95 points. This has the team in third place in the Western conference (Anaheim takes second as they have earned the points based upon one less game played). St. Louis has 97 points. Overall, in the League, the standings are the same, St. Louis, Anaheim, and San Jose as 1, 2, and 3. The top ten follow with Boston (93P), Pittsburgh (92P), Colorado (91P), Chicago (90P), Los Angeles (82P), Toronto (80P), and Minnesota (79P). 

Obviously, the points can and will change between now and the end of the season. Any of these top ten are good teams and have ‘slumps’ in wins. Will each of these teams maintain their slots? It’s doubtful. Too many others are banging on the front door.

The exciting part about the season is how San Jose has managed to quietly maintain its place in the top ten standings for the majority of the season to date (stats from the official NHL website). The only concern so far is the power play, which has struggled to convert opportunities at 22%, for 16^th place. Out of 68 games played, San Jose has only lost 17 games and had 7 overtime losses. Their combined regular and overtime wins is 34, which set them in 6^th place overall for stats. They have a 2.98 goals per game, putting them in the seventh spot in the League and compare that to the goals against per game of 2.35 which is good enough for the 4^th spot overall. The Sharks 5-on-5 goals for & against ratio is 1.24 per game for sixth place overall. Being short-handed on the penalty kill is an important part of defense and San Jose does this well a penalty kill percentage if 84.4, which has them taking the 7^th spot in the League. When it comes to putting the puck to the net, no one beats the Sharks: they are number one with an average of 34.8 shots per game and they don’t allow opponents to get to their net, either at an average of 27.8 shots, San Jose is fifth in least amount of shots allowed per game. When they out-shoot their opponent, the Sharks win 0.696% of their games, for first place. Finally, San Jose is very good in the face-off department, sitting in the third place with a winning 52.9%.

In the past, we (Sharks fans) know how the team does during the regular, and we have seen our team get knocked out during the post-season. This year is different. This team is a grinding, gritty, in-your-face bunch of guys. Winning the Cup is not just about winning 98 ice hockey games. To hoist the silver cup, one has to dig deep within oneself, find that fortitude & determination, and decide that nothing will stand in your way. It’s not an easy road. The Sharks have the Cup in their sights. The mainstream media have ignored them.

That’s okay. When Jumbo lifts the Grail, those reporters won’t ignore San Jose then. To end this, here are the latest stats from the San Jose Sharks website:

^{Forwards & Defensemen}

#	Pos	Player	GP	G	A	P	+/-	PIM	PP	SH	GW	S	S%
8	C	Joe Pavelski	68	34	32	66	22	28	11	1	3	179	19.0
19	C	Joe Thornton	68	10	55	65	19	16	2	0	3	95	10.5
12	L	Patrick Marleau	68	28	32	60	5	18	8	2	2	240	11.7
39	C	Logan Couture	52	18	26	44	17	14	3	1	3	188	9.6
57	C	Tommy Wingels	63	15	21	36	11	35	0	2	7	135	11.1
88	R	Brent Burns	55	18	17	35	26	24	1	0	2	194	9.3
5	D	Jason Demers	62	4	27	31	16	24	1	0	0	94	4.3
22	D	Dan Boyle	61	8	19	27	-3	24	6	0	1	122	6.6
48	C	Tomas Hertl	35	15	10	25	11	2	3	0	3	94	16.0
44	D	Marc-Edouard Vlasic	68	5	18	23	30	34	0	1	0	117	4.3
83	L	Matt Nieto	54	10	11	21	3	12	1	0	2	101	9.9
52	D	Matt Irwin	51	2	16	18	0	33	1	0	0	122	1.6
81	R	Tyler Kennedy	55	4	12	16	-4	30	0	0	1	125	3.2
61	D	Justin Braun	68	4	12	16	15	20	1	0	1	102	3.9
10	C	Andrew Desjardins	67	2	13	15	-4	84	0	0	1	80	2.5
15	L	James Sheppard	53	2	13	15	3	31	0	0	0	59	3.4
9	R	Marty Havlat	35	7	7	14	7	8	0	0	1	53	13.2
27	D	Scott Hannan	47	3	9	12	6	51	0	0	0	44	6.8
7	D	Brad Stuart	51	3	6	9	6	29	0	0	3	55	5.5
13	L	Raffi Torres	5	3	2	5	4	7	0	0	0	9	33.3
18	R	Mike Brown	39	2	3	5	-10	64	0	0	0	37	5.4
38	L	Bracken Kearns	22	3	1	4	1	6	1	0	0	35	8.6
43	C	John McCarthy	36	1	1	2	-11	4	0	0	0	49	2.0
42	R	Matt Pelech	6	1	0	1	1	22	0	0	1	3	33.3
76	R	Eriah Hayes	15	1	0	1	-2	2	0	0	0	17	5.9
37	R	Adam Burish	9	0	0	0	-2	4	0	0	0	6	0.0
75	C	Freddie Hamilton	11	0	0	0	-5	2	0	0	0	13	0.0

^GOALIES

#	Goalie	GPI	GS	Min	GAA	W	L	OT	SO	SA	GA	Sv%	G	A	PIM
31	Antti Niemi	53	53	3109	2.37	33	13	6	3	1405	123	.912	0	2	0
32	Alex Stalock	20	15	1038	1.91	11	4	1	2	479	33	.931	0	0	0

 ^{game highlights from Sharks verses New York Islanders}

^{http://video.sharks.nhl.com/videocenter/console?catid=-3&navid=TLN}

^{Former San Jose Shark draft pick Marco Sturm announced his retirement this year and did a ceremonial uck drop. Watch it here:}

^{http://video.sharks.nhl.com/videocenter/console?navid=TLN}

Go Sharks and say safe out there!!