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Burns beauty wins it late in
Minny
San Jose splits 2-gamer with Wild
The Sharks closed out their 2-game series with the
Minnesota Wild on Sunday night with a nail biting 5-3 win at Xcel Energy
Center. The Sharks built a 2-goal lead, then allowed Minnesota to tie the game
before Brent Burns scored one of the prettiest goals of his career to help San
Jose salvage a split after falling 48 hours earlier in Minneapolis.
Everyone was talking about the game winner, which came courtesy of Burns with
1:48 left in regulation. The Sharks defenseman grabbed a Tomas Hertl draw out
the outside of the right circle, then skated around a pair of Wild defenders
with four direction changes right-left-right-left, before lifting a backhand
shot from the doorstep past Wild goaltender Kaapo Kahkonen to break a 3-3 tie.
Burns dexterity and nimbleness with the puck was amazing for a man
that stands 6'5" and 230 pounds. His skating with the puck was a thing of
beauty, but the skill with the stick simply made the play special. It coming so
late in a tie game added to the drama.
It was simply clutch, given the
Sharks struggles and the fact that they had blown a two-goal lead against a
very good Wild roster. Minnesota came back twice against Los Angeles to start
the season, and looked primed to steal this game.
The Wild grabbed the
lead 4:21 into the game when Zach Parise deposited a Kirill Kaprizov feed from
the slot. Kaprizov raced up the right wing chasing the puck off the faceoff
before sliding a pass to Parise on his left. Timo Meier was late to provide
defensive support, allowing Parise to walk in on Martin Jones and flip a shot
over the netminder's left shoulder.
The Sharks controlled the offense
for much of the period, out-shooting Minnesota 12-3 in the frame. They would
convert late in the period when Ryan Donato flipped a seeing-eye shot on net
from the bottom of the right circle. Kevin Labanc sent a backhand drop pass to
Donato from the end boards, before the Sharks forward threw the puck to the
front of the net. The puck clipped Jared Spurgeon in the skate, altering the
trajectory of the shot perfectly under goaltender Kaapo Kahkonen's right leg
pad for his 2nd goal of the season.
A wild two minute span saw the
Sharks score a pair of goals, but more importantly those tallies sandwiched a
would be goal by Minnesota that was overturned after a challenge.
Evander Kane started the sequence with his 2nd goal of the season on a power
play after Kevin Fiala was sent off for high sticking. Kane was on the tail end
of a passing exchange started by Donato, who sent a cross-ice feed to Meier on
the left wing. Meier caught Kane pinching in the slot, feeding him with a one
time chance that beat Kahkonen for the 2-1 Sharks lead.
The Wild
thought they had tied the game after the next faceoff when they pushed a puck
across the goal line, but a challenge confirmed that Bjugstad pushed Jones' leg
pad over the line, carrying it over the line.
San Jose responded
immediately.
Noah Gregor sent a long shot in on net from the right
wing boards, catching Kahkonen in the glove, but the Wild netminder couldn't
control the puck. It floated over home for Gregor's 1st goal of the season, but
more importantly it padded the Sharks lead.
That came in handy when Bjugstad deflected a Spurgeon
shot with 3:13 remaining in the period.
A Markus Sorensen slashing
penalty at 7:16 of the 3rd period would haunt the Sharks. Minnesota took all of
4 seconds on the power play to convert when Fiala fired a shot past Jones to
tie the game.
Burns worked his magic late in the period and Matt Nieto
added an empty-net goal to cap the scoring. Even the empty-netter was an
adventure. Sorensen looked to be off-side as Nieto entered the Minnesota zone,
but a challenge ruled that the extra goal would stand.
Game
Notes:
* Tomas Hertl took a puck off the inside of his left knee in
the 3rd period, which required treatment on the bench.
* Nikolai
Knyzhov squared off with Jordan Greenway in the 2nd period with what should
have been the rookie's first fighting major, but referees issued roughing
minors to the two bantam-weights.
* Ryan Donato led the Sharks with a
goal and an assist. The goal was special for the new Shark, who spent the last
two season with Minnesota.
* Dylan Gambrell won 12 of 16 draws for the
Sharks for a hefty 75% faceoff conversion rate.
* Timo Meier and Logan
Couture led the Sharks with 5 shots each. Meier has struggled early this
season.
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Feeder Forums |
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1 |
2 |
3 |
T |
| SJ |
1 |
2 |
2 |
5 |
| MIN |
1 |
1 |
1 |
3 |
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| 1st period - 1, MIN,
Parise 2 (Kaprizov), 4:21. 2, SJ, Donato 2 (Labanc, Karlsson), 19:02. |
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| 2nd period - 3, SJ, Kane
2 (Meier, Donato), 6:39, (pp). 4, SJ, Gregor 1 (Ferraro), 8:26. 5, MIN,
Bjugstad 1 (Spurgeon, Suter), 16:47. |
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| 3rd period - 6, MIN,
Fiala 2 (Suter, Parise), 7:20, (pp). 7, SJ, Burns 2 (Hertl), 18:12. 8, SJ,
Nieto 2 (), 19:31, (en). |
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| 1st period - Bench, SJ
(too many men), 7:54; Hartman, MIN (interfernce), 10:34; Bjustad, MIN
(hooking), 19:45. |
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| 2nd period - Fiala, MIN
(high sticking), 5:17; Karlsson, SJ (holding the stick), 10:43; Knyzov, SJ
(roughing), 16:41; Greenway, MIN (roughing), 16:41. |
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| 3rd period - Sorensen,
SJ (slashing), 7:16; Burns, SJ (rouging), 10:32; Greenway, MIN (roughing),
10:32; Sorensen, SJ (tripping), 14:34; Soucy, MIN (slashing), 19:48. |
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Shots |
Saves |
| SJ - Jones |
18 |
16 |
| MIN - Khakonen |
24 |
21 |
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1 |
2 |
3 |
T |
| SJ |
12 |
12 |
12 |
36 |
| MIN |
3 |
15 |
11 |
29 |
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| Xcel Energy Center -
attendence not available |
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| Referees: Pochmara,
Rooney. Linesmen: Flemington, Suchanek. |
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