San Jose Sharks Evens the Score

San Jose Evens the Score
“We wanted to get off to a great start tonight.”--Torrey Mitchell

By Barbara Mason 4/11/08
Bay Area Sport/Raiderdrive.com

Before a sell-out crowd, the San Jose Sharks evened the score with the Calgary Flames with a 2-0 shutout victory. While the game may have started out on the slow side, it sizzled throughout the second and third periods for the Sharks. They shot a franchise record 27 shots on goal in the second period. Evgeni Nabokov made 21 saves in the game to record his sixth career post-season shutout. The play of this series thus far came in the third period when Nabokov made a miraculous save on a shot that was a certain goal off the stick of Owen Nolan. That save had Nolan himself shaking his head in disbelief.

Joe Pavelski turned in the first score in the second period for the early 1-0 lead. “They (Calgary) came out fast. They’re going to come out fast in every period; they are a good team and they are going to work hard,” said Pavelski after the win. “They wanted this one just as bad as we did. Everybody’s been playing great. We’ve just got to keep getting better every game,” he said. San Jose was able to achieve the success that is going to be needed to get anything past Calgary goalie Kiprusoff. “He’s human. He’s going to let a few pucks in,” he said of Kip.

Torrey Mitchell scored the second goal of the evening. “We wanted to get off to a great start tonight. Kind of how we finished the first game,” he said. “They had four penalties in a row, so that was huge for us to get at least one goal,” he said.

It was a pleased head coach Ron Wilson that met with the media after the game. “I thought we were pushing the pace and forced them into taking some penalties,” said Wilson. “It took a little while to wear down Kiprusoff but we eventually got to him.”

The Sharks will now head into hostile Flame territory for games 3 and 4. The Sharks have been skating better with each game and it could very well be a repeat of the regular season; a bit of a slow start and finishing like gangbusters. There are still a few players that we have not hear from as of yet promising the best that is yet to come. The good news is that the team is skating strong and fast and everyone is on board; the perfect formula for a winning post season.