San Jose Sharks’ Furious Start Dazzles Edmonton Oilers, 6-3

The San Jose Sharks defeated Edmonton Oilers 6-3, keeping a positive atmosphere in the locker room. The Sharks now have four straight wins and are slowly starting to climb up in the Western Conference standings.

The hosts’ offense was superb today, as they had six different guys who scored. The guests form Canada didn’t know who to defend at certain moments of the event. However, Peter DeBoer, Sharks’ coach, was more satisfied with the defensive efforts of his crew.

“I thought we did a good job defending McDavid, Draisaitl as a group tonight,” he said, adding that an early goal helped his team by removing the pressure and allowing them to play more relaxed.

“We got the first goal, removing the pressure off, we got to play in front most of the night, so those kinds of things make a difference,” DeBoer told.

Brent Burns opened the show 4:01 into the game, netting from the top of the left circle. Some 2:26 later, Evander Kane doubled the lead. It was the 11th goal of the season for the Sharks’ left-winger, who leads the team in that category.

The veteran Patrick Marleau added another one midway through the period, and at that point, it was apparent that the guests don’t have the solution on how to compete with the fired-up Sharks.

Barclay Goodrow definitely knocked out the guests from Edmonton, by deflecting a shot from Timo Meier, 86 seconds since the start of the second period.

“They start really strong at home… everyone knows that coming in here,” Draisaitl said. “We weren’t ready, and being down 3-0 in this building is hard to come back from.”

The hosts decreased the tempo after that, but when Draisaitl scored at 9:57, things became a bit tense. Until the end of the frame, we saw the fight between Goodrow and Brandon Manning. The latter received a game misconduct and a five-minute major, while Goodrow had to go out for five minutes. Everything started when Thomas Hertl sent Connor McDavid on the ice with a hip hit, and Zack Kassian wanted to get even with Hertl. In the meantime, Manning and Goodrow started fighting, and there was chaos on the ice in no time.

Oilers became even more frustrated once Hertl scored for 5-1 at 17:34, as the guy who caused all the problems earlier beat their goalie Mike Smith. Kassian decreased it to 5-2, converting his own rebound, 9:08 in the third, and Timo Meier responded 1:22 after that, to lift back the Sharks to a four-goal distance.

Sam Gagner added his first of the season, at 12:18, inside the last frame, to set the final result, San Jose 6, Edmonton 3.

Oilers’ captain Connor McDavid admitted that his team wasn’t ready for such a start, although they knew that the Sharks come out strong when playing at the Tank.

“We weren’t ready to go off the hop,” McDavid said. “They come out strong here in this building, and we definitely know that. Now it’s happened to us a couple of times in this building, and we have to be better.”

Edmonton is now 12-6-2, and still holds the top spot in the Pacific Division, two points away from the champions St. Louis Blues, but also with one game more. After a two-game visit to California where they met with the Anaheim Ducks before this one, Tippett’s guys are going back home to face the Avalanche this Thursday, and after that, the Dallas Stars on Saturday.

San Jose (8-10-1) faces with the Ducks in Anaheim on Thursday, before hosting the Detroit Red Wings and the Oilers once again.