Yes, it’s the Sharks first Stanley Cup Final win, but it’s also the first “lead” for San Jose in their first Final appearance. He will likely start with the same lines, but don’t be surprised if he shuffles around those bottom six forwards for Game 4.
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The San Jose Sharks will be playing Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final without top-line winger Tomas Hertl, who will miss his second straight game with an undisclosed injury. First, he got stuck in a bad spot and allowed Hertl to use his leg to bank the puck in and then he got stuck in no-man’s land as he neither followed Marleau behind his team’s net, nor did he try to help out on another forward.
In the first two games of the Final in Pittsburgh, the Penguins came away with a 2-0 series lead based on a late goal by Nick Bonino in Game 1 and an overtime goal by Conor Sheary in Game 2, but both margins could have been much bigger if not for the stellar play of San Jose goalie Martin Jones. With the Sharks winning Game 3 on Saturday that means that no matter what happens the rest of the way, they will not be swept. Eastern on NBC in the U.S.
And according to San Jose head coach Peter DeBoer, the best is yet to come in Game 4 on Monday at SAP Center. While Pittsburgh has a 2-1 lead at this point, it will make the Penguins that much more unsafe if their longtime superstar puts the puck in the back of the net. “That takes you out of your four-line rhythm”. The Penguins outshot the Sharks, 42-26, in their loss, making their Cup Final shot advantage 113-74. “But does the fact that they have [39] more shots in the series bother me?”
Ironically, with all the times the Penguins got in San Jose’s shooting lanes, Ward fired a fairly innocent slapshot from just inside the painted Stanley Cup Final logo in the very high slot of the offensive zone off the rush that Murray saw all the way, yet somehow couldn’t stop at the 8:48 mark of the third period.
“Ever since he’s been here, he’s just so calm and so confident”, Thornton said about Jones.
Not so fast. I leapt back up in unison with the 20,000 Sharks fans in the Tank and the hundreds of thousands of fans around the world expelling yet another of the many demons living in our respective closets. I’m not sure where the puck was going. He was only assessed a two-minute minor on the play on something that certainly looked like “five and a game” to me.
“We had some chances”, Pittsburgh captain Sidney Crosby said per NHL.com. “I think we did that a couple times tonight”.
This time, it was San Jose who scored the victor. I think the L.A. series, we had the lead nearly every game, maybe other than one.
Thornton had at least two more good chances to score, rounding out an impactful Game 3 performance following two quiet games to start the series. Murray had a clear look at it, it was from a pretty good distance, it wasn’t deflected, and it just pretty much leaked right through him to tie the game.
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The general impression is that the Penguins have dominated the series, but two games have gone to overtime and Game 1 was decided in the final minutes of regulation. If they truly want to make a statement that this type of hit no longer belongs in the game, they will do just that and suspend him for one game.
