SAN JOSE, Calif. – One day after the San Jose Sharks lost on the road in overtime to the last-place team in the Pacific Division, they welcomed the NHL’s best team to SAP Center on Saturday night.
Unfortunately for the Sharks, the end result was about the same.
The Sharks allowed goals to David Pastrnak in the second and third periods and were unable to come up with a response in a 4-2 loss to the Boston Bruins before a sellout crowd of 17,562 at the downtown arena.
With Sharks defenseman Matt Benning serving a holding penalty, Pastrnak took a pass from Brad Marchand and beat a screened James Reimer to give the Bruins a 3-2 lead at the 16:45 mark of the second period.
Pastrnak then scored an insurance goal, his 29th of the season, as he took a pass from Patrice Bergeron and beat an outstretched Reimer at the 9:00 mark of the third period.
The Sharks created some chances to try and crawl back into the game but were unable to get the equalizer as they fell to 1-3-2 in games since the Christmas break. San Jose had 13 shots in the final 20 minutes and 28 for the game as Bruins goalie Linus Ullmark improved his record this season to 22-1-1.
The Sharks ended the first half of the season with a 12-21-8 record, with their 32 points at this point of the season representing their fewest at the midway since the 1995-96 season when they had an 8-29-4 record.
Logan Couture and Mario Ferraro scored even-strength goals for the Sharks. Defenseman Erik Karlsson had his franchise-record 14-game point streak snapped.
The Bruins entered Saturday’s game with the NHL’s best record at 30-4-4, with their last regulation-time loss coming on Dec. 9 in Arizona. Since then, Boston had gone 9-0-3 to move into sole possession of first place in the NHL’s overall standings.
“We’ve played a lot of great teams hard this year and we don’t have to concoct some secret formula to win a hockey game,” Sharks coach David Quinn said before Saturday’s game. “You’ve got to do the things we’ve done, obviously not enough this year, but we’ve got to follow the blueprint that we’ve created when we’re successful and do it for 60 minutes and not take our foot off the pedal.”
The Sharks didn’t start on time as the Bruins took a 2-0 lead in the first 5:32 of the opening period.
Marchand gave Boston a 1-0 lead 63 seconds in as he went from one end to the other, shedding a check from Kevin Labanc, and getting past both Ferraro and Scott Harrington before he beat Reimer with a backhand high to the glove side for his 12th goal of the season.
Just 4:30 later, the Sharks gave too much space in the slot to Craig Smith, who beat Reimer with another glove-side shot that the San Jose netminder probably should have stopped.
Reimer, though, settled down after that and finished the first period with 10 saves in what was his first start since Dec. 31. His best save came with just under two minutes to go, as he stretched out with his stick to stop defenseman Charlie McAvoy’s wraparound attempt to keep it a 2-1 Boston lead.
The Sharks’ goal came 1:25 after Smith’s goal, as Alexander Barabanov took a stretch pass from Marc-Edouard Vlasic and fed Couture, who raced toward the front of the Bruins net and redirected the puck past Bruins goalie Linus Ullmark for his 15th goal of the season.
Reimer needed a good result. In his last six games before Saturday, he had a 2-3-1 record and a .879 save percentage, dropping his overall save percentage this season to a pedestrian .896.
Between Reimer, Kaapo Kahkonen, Aaron Dell, and Eetu Makiniemi, the Sharks entered Saturday with an NHL-worst .879 save percentage. The Bruins’ save percentage was a league-best .926.
In 11 home games this season, Reimer, before Saturday, was 2-7-2 with a .887 save percentage and 3.48 goals against average.
The Sharks were coming off a 5-4 overtime loss to the Anaheim Ducks on Friday in which they were, at times, their own worst enemy.
Turnovers led directly to three Anaheim goals, including John Klingberg’s overtime winner. Tomas Hertl gave away the puck along the boards near the Ducks’ blue line, then didn’t backcheck hard enough to get to Klingberg in time before he one-timed a pass from Troy Terry past Kaapo Kahkonen.
