On Monday night, the Vegas Golden Knights thrashed the Sharks in San Jose, 7-3, and prevented the Sharks from clinching a playoff berth.
Jonathan Marchessault struck twice and added two assists for the Knights in the victory.
“It was super intense,” Marchessault said. “They came out flying. They were all over us. The crowd was really wild. It was definitely a playoff atmosphere game.”
The Sharks have lost three straight now and need to win one game to clinch the berth.
They dropped to 43-22-8.
Malcolm Subban made 36 saves to get the win for Vegas.
“These are like playoff games,” Subban said. “Obviously we played these guys last year for six games, so definitely some of that bad blood carried over.”
Logan Couture had two goals for the Sharks.
“It’s concerning because we aren’t playing well,” Couture said. “We handed them goals tonight. … We’re giving up too many chances, too many easy goals. We’re giving up odd-man rushes. We have to get back to shooting the puck.”
The Knights improved to 41-27-5 with the win.
“We’re a very deep team. We’re going to give teams fits with matchup problems. Tonight, for that [first] line to go power on power and dominate their first line makes the game a lot easier for the rest of us.” Vegas’ Mark Stone said.
Reilly Smith, Stone, Paul Stastny, William Karlsson, and Cody Eakin also scored for the Golden Knights.
“Right now we’re playing really well, maybe the best we have this season,” Karlsson said. “It’s been a little bit of a roller-coaster for our line this year; we weren’t happy with how we were playing. It’s nice we can contribute again.”
Joe Thornton also scored for the Sharks.
“We were the chasing the game,” Sharks head coach Peter DeBoer said. “That’s a team if you are chasing them, they are going to make you pay. They were good at that. They were better than us on special teams.
“The regular season really doesn’t have a bearing on the playoffs. We’ve proven that before here. We learned some lessons tonight. We just shot ourselves in foot.”
[WATCH: All Golden Knights vs. Sharks highlights]
Martin Jones was the starter for the Sharks but made just eight saves while surrendering three goals in the first period; he was given the hook at 12:24 of the opening frame.
“You can’t be worried what you are doing three weeks from now. We need points now. It doesn’t matter what happens in the past, you just move forward. We need to get back to our game, get in deep, less turnovers in the neutral zone and forecheck,” Justin Braun said after the loss.
Aaron Dell relieved Jones and who made 27 saves the rest of the way.
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