The sweep of the NHL starts in Chicago where the visiting San Jose Sharks got 33 saves from Martin Jones as they shutout the Blackhawks, 2-0.
Patrick Marleau scored a power play goal, the only chance of the night for the Sharks, and they killed off all three penalties they faced.
“The guys played hard and gave them, really, nothing,” said Sharks captain Joe Pavelski, who assisted on Marleau’s goal. “The PK was great [and] the power play. The special teams were there for us. [Jones] was solid. [We’re] playing a good team game right now.”
Joe Thornton scored an empty-netter to seal the impressive win for the Sharks.
“We’ve been good with the lead all year, so it’s important for us to get the first goal,” Jones said. “With a team like [the Blackhawks], they can score goals pretty well. You never know what can happen, but we were really good all night.”
Corey Crawford made 25 saves for the win.
The Blackhawks had seemingly taken a 1-0 lead off a goal by Brandon Mashinter early but a coach’s challenge was called by Sharks coach Peter DeBoer.
“I didn’t see it from the bench,” he said. “Dan Darrow, our coach behind the scenes here, caught it from an overhead view. Great call by him. Key call at that time of the game, and really changed the game for us.”
In Calgary, Markus Granlund scored once and had two points in the Flames 4-3 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Granlund had been a healthy scratch in three straight games.
“Who knows?” Granlund said. “I didn’t want to think about it. It’s just a hockey game. You have to play with the guys who are playing. Every time when you get a chance, you have to show that you’ve earned it.”
He was in because the Flames are fading and their bench boss, Bob Hartley is sending messages to his team. Tuesday night he scratched Johnny Gaudreau, Sean Monahan, and Lance Bouma.
“It was very simple,” Calgary coach Bob Hartley said. “We established team rules at the start of the season. We’re a very proud hockey club. We have built what we believe to be a very strong culture, and that goes for everyone.
“I know people say, ‘It’s the top two scorers.’ It’s not the players. It’s not about the people involved. It’s about the Calgary Flames. It was tough. It was tough because you can’t get three better young men. They’re proud of representing this community. They’re easy to coach and everything, but when you make a mistake, we have to be accountable and we have to be fair to everyone.”
Mikael Backlund, Micheal Ferland and Dougie Hamilton scored for the Flames.
“I thought we played really well,” Hamilton said. “When you’re missing three of your better players, it’s tougher for your team but everyone stepped up and I thought we played pretty good.”
The Leafs have lost six of their eight games and have returned to an old, unwanted form in losing in games they should competed harder.
Peter Holland, Josh Leivo, and Jake Gardiner scored for the Leafs.
They have been forgiven for some loss of intensity after the Leafs traded captain Dion Phaneuf, forwards Matt Frattin, Casey Bailey and Ryan Rupert, and defenseman Cody Donaghey the Ottawa Senators for defenseman Jared Cowen and forwards Milan Michalek, Colin Greening and Tobias Lindberg, along with the Senators’ second-round pick in the 2017 NHL Draft.
“The way I found out was on my phone, I think like most people,” Gardiner said. “It was pretty emotional for a lot of the guys — one of our really good friends and obviously our leader on our team (got traded). It started that way. Obviously it was tough all day long and we just tried to refocus for the game. I thought we competed well, but (we) just didn’t start the way we wanted to.”
Jonas Hiller made 33 saves for the win.
In Montreal, the Canadiens continued their “get healthy” streak with a 4-2 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Tomas Plekanec scored twice and had three points on the night.
“It was longer than it should have been,” Plekanec said. “I’m not a fan of saying that I didn’t get a bounce here or there, but you play differently when you get those good first periods, when you get the goal and get something going right away. When you don’t, you get yourself in a hole and that’s what happened.”
Ben Scrivens made 37 stops for the Habs in the win.
“[Plekanec is] playing extremely well for us,” Scrivens said. “It seems like he’s either scoring every night or at least generating chances and making the guys on his line better, so that’s what we need from him and it’s great to see him step up and be a leader just by his actions on the ice. He’s not the loudest guy in the room, but the guys are definitely taking notice of what he’s doing on the ice.”
Valtteri Filppula and Victor Hedman scored for the Lightning.
“Ultimately the net was a little smaller for us and they shoot a puck wide, it deflects off a skate and goes in, and we seemed to hit the post all night,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “Their goalie played well, but we got scoring from one line. We scored three goals in two nights and one line got all three of them, so when your top guys aren’t scoring it makes it a little tougher for us.”
Ben Bishop made 23 saves in the loss.
“Obviously you’d like to win these when you’re ahead of teams like this but (there’s) not much you can do about it now,” Bishop said. “We have four really good teams coming in here so it’s going to be important to put this behind us and get ready.”
Devante Smith-Pelly and Brendan Gallagher also scored for the Canadiens.
You must be logged in to post a comment.