SAN JOSE \u2013 The San Jose Sharks will likely not be turning their attention toward next season as long as they remain mathematically alive for a playoff spot this year \u2013 which might not be for much longer.<\/p>\n
Still, it\u2019s not too hard to peek into the future and envision Igor Chernyshov playing on the Sharks\u2019 top line alongside Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith in the team\u2019s 2026-27 season opener this fall.<\/p>\n
Chernyshov was back with Celebrini and Smith for the Sharks\u2019 final regular-season home game on Saturday and had his second career two-goal game in what became a 4-3 shootout loss to the Vancouver Canucks on Fan Appreciation Night at SAP Center.<\/p>\n
Celebrini was the only Sharks player to beat Canucks goalie Kevin Lankinen in six shootout rounds. Linus Karlsson, a third-round draft pick by the Sharks in 2018, was one of two Vancouver players to beat goalie Yaroslav Askarov, as San Jose lost for the fourth time in five games (1-3-1).<\/p>\n
\u201cJust some of our details, I would say, is the biggest thing,\u201d Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky said. \u201cDetails in our (defensive) zone, which was tonight. In previous games, there were some other issues.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Sharks led 3-2 on Chernyshov\u2019s second goal at the 12:44 mark of the third period, but\u00a0allowed a game-tying power play goal to Teddy Blueger with 3:00 left in regulation time.<\/p>\n
The Sharks went 2-for-4 on the penalty kill for the game, and are 7-for-18 on the man disadvantage over the last six games.<\/p>\n
Tyler Toffoli also scored, and Askarov made 38 saves as the Sharks ended the season with a 21-14-6 record at home, a nine-win improvement over last year (12-27-2).<\/p>\n
Still, with the overtime loss, the Sharks\u2019 tragic number for playoff elimination was reduced to two. With 82 points, the Sharks are now five points back of the Los Angeles Kings for the second wild card spot in the Western Conference. Both the Sharks and Kings have three games left.<\/p>\n
The Sharks are also four points behind the ninth-place Nashville Predators, who have two games left. The first is on Monday at home against the Sharks, who finish the regular season on a three-game road trip, with other stops in Chicago on Wednesday and Winnipeg on Thursday.<\/p>\n
The Sharks had less than a 3% chance to make the postseason before their game on Saturday, per moneypuck.com.<\/p>\n
The Sharks allowed second-period goals to Marco Rossi \u2014 on a bizarre play \u2013\u2013 and Jake DeBrusk on a Canucks power play as the two teams entered the third period tied 2-2.<\/p>\n
On Rossi\u2019s goal, Canucks defenseman Victor Mancini sent the puck the length of the ice. Askarov went out to play the puck after icing was waved off. But he didn\u2019t get to it in time as it went off the boards right to Rossi, who shot the puck into the abandoned net, as Askarov knocked over the net.<\/p>\n
Askarov, perhaps sarcastically, said tipping over the net was his attempt to try and stop Rossi\u2019s shot after he was caught out of position.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, lucky bounce and we\u2019ll take that,\u201d Rossi said. \u201cWe played a good game because we just kept it short out there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chernyshov opened the scoring in the first period.<\/p>\n
Celebrini controlled a faceoff in the Canucks\u2019 zone and got the puck to Chernyshov, who went forehand to backhand to beat goalie Kevin Lankinen at the 16:19 mark of the first period.<\/p>\n
The goal came two nights after Chernyshov was a healthy scratch in San Jose\u2019s 6-1 loss to the Anaheim Ducks.<\/p>\n
With the Sharks inside the Canucks\u2019 zone, Chernyshov, on his second goal, took a pass from Celebrini and beat goalie Lankinen glove side with a wrist shot from the slot for his seventh goal in 25 NHL games this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe knows how to get open. You see,\u00a0his goal scoring is one of his best attributes,\u201d Celebrini said. \u201cHe\u2019s just such a force out there. It was great for him to get those goals.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2013 The San Jose Sharks will likely not be turning their attention toward next season as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":263684,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[404,88,90,89,98,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-263683","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-jose","8":"tag-nhl","9":"tag-san-jose","10":"tag-san-jose-headlines","11":"tag-san-jose-news","12":"tag-san-jose-sharks","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263683\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}