The Minnesota Wild were heavily criticized for not making any moves at the trade deadline, especially because they had the lowest total goals scored in the league, and their top star, Marian Gaborik, has yet to return from injury. But the Wild found their offensive stride in San Jose, scoring 4 unanswered goals to come back from a 3-0 deficit to defeat the Sharks 4-3 in overtime.
The Sharks had been struggling with their offense, but it seemed that they finally became the dominating team they were in the first half of the season. Joe Pavelski, who only played 5 minutes in the 4-1 loss against Dallas because he was ejected from a bad call, came back strong. Pavelski scored the first goal of the game 11 minutes in, crashing the net and tipping a Ryane Clowe pass past the recently re-signed Niklas Backstrom to give the Sharks the early 1-0 lead. Then, 4 minutes later, Clowe found a rebound off of Rob Blake's shot at the side of the net and roofed it for the 2-0 lead. Clowe shot the puck so hard that the goal light didn't turn on and the referee never saw it, but after a brief video replay it was clearly determined a goal.
Then in the second period, the Sharks continued dominating the offensive game. The Sharks put three straight shifts together where a forward carried the puck along the side boards to drop a pass to a pinching defenseman for a shot on goal, looking for the rebound. The third time was the charm, as Marc-Edouard Vlasic pinched in, shot a puck off Backstrom, and Pavelski found the rebound and put the puck into a wide open net for his second goal of the game to give San Jose the 3-0 lead. But the Sharks fell apart in the dying minutes of the second period. With a little over 2 minutes left in the period, Mikko Koivu tipped a Marc-Andre Bergeron shot from the point right over the head of Brian Boucher, which rang off the crossbar and into the net. Then, less than two minutes later, Pierre-Marc Bouchard caught the Sharks on a line change, walked into the zone untouched, and shot the puck right over Boucher's shoulder to cut the San Jose lead down to 1 goal, sending the Wild into the locker room down 3-2 at the end of the second.
The third period had some wide open action at both ends of the ice, but a fluke goal sent the game to overtime. Halfway through the third, on a routine play, Marek Zidlicky backhanded the puck into the San Jose zone on a normal dump in play. Unfortunately for Boucher, the puck took a not so normal bounce to the net, flipping to the left and past his glove to tie the game 3-3. The goal seemed to suck all the energy out of the Sharks for the remainder of the third, as they blew their 3 goal lead and the game was sent into overtime.
San Jose had the majority of the chances in overtime, putting up 5 shots on goal to Minnesota's 3. But Backstrom made all the key saves, and Koivu was the recipient of a Brent Burns shot that rebounded off Boucher's leg right onto his stick for an easy tap in goal to win the game with 13 seconds left.
San Jose has now lost 3 games in a row, with the last two on home ice, where they are the most dominant team in the NHL. The Sharks had two chances on the power play, but could not convert as they were facing the league's best penalty killing unit, going up against the defensive-minded Minnesota Wild. The only two penalties in the game were called against the Wild, who have killed 36 of their last 38 penalties. With the win, Minnesota is still out of a playoff spot in the Western Conference, but they are now only 1 point behind the 8th place, which is currently held by three teams with 68 points: the Edmonton Oilers, the Anaheim Ducks, and the Dallas Stars who lost in overtime against the Kings today. The loss in overtime still gave San Jose 1 point in the standings, which ties them for first place in the Western Conference and the NHL with the Detroit Red Wings, with both teams sharing a 94 point total, but San Jose still has a 2 game advantage over their conference rivals. San Jose scored 3 goals for the first time in 5 games, but all 3 goal came from their second line. Milan Michalek assisted on all 3 goals. After only scoring 2 even strength goals out of 7 goals in the last 5 games, their 3 goals all came from 5 on 5 hockey. Brian Boucher got his 4th straight start, after Evgeni Nabokov, who was out with the flu for the past two games, suffered what was described as a "minor" lower body injury in practice Tuesday. It is uncertain if Nabokov will start the Sharks's next game, where they travel to Vancouver to play the Canucks on Saturday, as Thomas Greiss was recalled from the AHL before Thursday night's game to backup Brian Boucher.
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