SAN JOSE – The good news is that the San Jose Sharks continue to
be almost unbeatable in regulation play in the Stanley Cup
Playoffs.
SAN JOSE – The good news is that the San Jose Sharks continue to be almost unbeatable in regulation play in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
The bad news is that, for the third time in four tries, overtime proved costly when Steve Montador scored the game-winner 18:43 into the fourth period to give the visiting Calgary Flames a 4-3 nod over the Sharks in the opener of the Western Conference finals at sold-out HP Pavilion on Sunday. San Jose lost despite setting a team record for shots attempted with 52.
The second game of the best-of-seven conference Finals will be played at 6 p.m. Tuesday in San Jose before action switches to Calgary for games Thursday and Sunday.
The Flames bolted to a 2-0 lead in the first period, only to have San Jose respond with two goals in the second period. Calgary gained the momentum in the third period on Steve Conroy’s second goal of the game at the 9:25 mark. The Sharks were able to force overtime when Alexander Korolyuk’s flick shot from the right circle skimmed over goalie Miikka Kiprusoff’s shoulder for the equalizer at the 16:39 mark.
“It’s fun,” responded Calgary coach and general manager Darryl Sutter — the former Sharks coach — to questions about the high-paced game that featured 90 shots on net. “Both teams can really skate. It was more wide-open than both teams wanted.”
“I’m proud of the effort of our team,” coach Ron Wilson said of the Sharks’ first game in five days. “We’ve got to stick with the plan and good things will happen. We’ll play the same way and see what happens. We had a ton of scoring chances. We need to make sure we don’t repeat some of those mistakes.”
The Sharks peppered Kiprusoff, the former Shark, with a dozen shots in the overtime, but Calgary pounced on a poor line change to score the game-winner. Sean Donovan, another ex-Shark, controlled a loose puck in the neutral zone and passed to Jarome Iginla before crashing toward the Sharks net. Iginla’s drop pass to a trailing Montador left the Calgary defenseman unmarked in the slot for the snap shot inside the left post from 15 feet.
“We spent most of the (overtime) period in their end,” said Wilson. “I’m disappointed to lose the way we did, a detail thing — a bad change. They took advantage of the only mistake we made in overtime. We didn’t place the puck right (on the fateful change). We didn’t have a sense of danger.”
The results from the first period did not point to the game ever going to overtime, as Calgary deflected an 18-11 deficit in shots on net to produce a 2-0 cushion.
Kryzystof Oliwa tallied the first goal of the series when he slipped a short rebound of Oleg Saprykin’s shot over goalie Evgeni Nabokov at 9:26.
“You can’t allow a fourth-line player, Krzysztof Oliwa, to score,” Wilson said. “We lost him there.”
The Sharks frittered away a 5-on-3 power play at the 16:17 mark after both Chris Clark and Chris Simon were sent to the penalty box.
“We had too much individual play,” said Wilson of the missed opportunity. “That’s something we’ll work on.”
Calgary added a 4-on-4 goal with 31 seconds left in the period to make it 2-0.
Donovan and Conroy rushed up-ice in a 2-on-1 breakaway against lone defender Brad Stuart. Conroy carried the puck along the right circle before wristing the puck across Nabokov and into the cage.
The Sharks needed just 1:23 of the second period to solve Kiprusoff. Scott Thornton’s hard shot from the left flank dropped of a defenseman and into the crease next to Kiprusoff. Mike Ricci shook off pressure from defenseman Jordan Leopold to tap in the goal from point-blank range.
Kiprusoff had a streak of 169:55 of playoff shut-out goaltending end with Ricci’s heroics.
For the second consecutive period, a goal was scored in the final minute of play. The Sharks claimed the tying goal when Todd Harvey completed a give-and-go move with linemate Wayne Primeau, eventually redirecting Primeau’s shot from the right boards past Kiprusoff with 57.4 seconds left.
The Sharks had “three chances to clear the puck” just before Conroy made it 3-2 with a bullet from the blueline, Wilson added.
The Flames kept the lead for more than seven minutes. Korolyuk turned a soft pass from Mike Rathje into a goal with 3:21 left in regulation as linemate NIls Ekman created a screen in front of Kiprusoff.
“We’re not in a panic mode,” said Sharks winger Scott Thornton. “We did a lot of good things.”
“We carried the play most of the game,” added defenseman Scott Hannan. “Kiprusoff kept them in the game.”
“Our energy level was incredible,” said Wilson. “We were able to roll four lines. Three lines scored — that was really huge for us.”
