There was a scare or two along the way, but the Sharks improved their chances to reach the playoffs Saturday night with a 4-3 shootout victory over the Phoenix Coyotes at HP Pavilion.
Michal Handzus and Ryane Clowe scored in the shootout while goalie Antti Niemi blanked Mikkel Boedker and Ray Whitney to end the one-on-one battle after only two rounds.
The victory gave San Jose 86 points for the season, putting the Sharks in a three-way tie for eighth place and the final playoff spot in the Western Conference. Los Angeles and Colorado are tied with the Sharks. Pacific Division leader Dallas is one point ahead of the logjam with 87 points.
San Jose got its goals from Patrick Marleau, Brent Burns and Daniel Winnik, while the Coyotes' scoring came from Daymond Langkow, Derek Morris and Lauri Korpikoski.
The Sharks came within one-half second of holding a 2-1 lead at the end of the first period, but it didn't come to pass.
The Coyotes did get on the scoreboard first when San Jose lost track of the puck behind its own net and Phoenix forward Gilbert Brule was able to get it to Langkow, whose quick shot from the slot beat Niemi at 6:31.
Marleau got his first goal in nine games less than two minutes later, however, when he pressured Coyotes forward Korpikoski to rush his clearing pass right onto Joe Thornton's stick. Marleau got the puck back right away and beat Coyotes netminder Mike Smith from just outside the crease.
Burns
gave the Sharks a 2-1 lead at 17:28 when Joe Pavelski worked hard to get him the puck, and the shot that followed deflected past Smith off a Coyotes defenseman's stick.
But in the final seconds of the first period, Marc-Edouard Vlasic twice turned the puck over to the Coyotes, and Morris surprised himself and Niemi by getting the puck in the slot for a quick shot that beat the clock by 0.5 seconds and knotted things up at 2-2.
As if a goal in the last second of one period isn't bad enough, the Sharks also gave up one in the first minute of the second when Whitney carried the puck toward the net off the sideboards, then slid a perfect pass to Korpikoski, who deflected the puck past Niemi at the 49-second mark.
San Jose got that one back, however, when Winnik scored his second goal in two games after going 43 contests without one, firing a 36-foot slap shot past Smith from the right faceoff circle.
The Sharks came close to breaking the 3-3 tie with about six minutes left in the game when Thornton had the puck just outside the crease, but Smith didn't give him much of an opening to shoot at. The San Jose captain then centered the puck, but neither Marleau nor Pavelski could get a stick on it.
Marty Havlat and Pavelski both got good looks at the net later, but neither could get the puck past Smith.
- Clowe left the game in the second period after being struck in the front of the helmet by a Burns slap shot while on the power play. He did return.
- Left wing TJ Galiardi skated Saturday for the first time since suffering the upper back injury that has caused him to miss five games.
"Today was a good test day for his injury," coach Todd McLellan said. "We'd like him to be ready to go and provide some energy to our team that we need. I'd like to have the ability to access that."
No timetable was set for Galiardi's return, though both he and his coach are hoping it happens well before the end of the season.
Galiardi and Winnik were obtained from the Colorado Avalanche on the Feb. 27 trade deadline in exchange for Jamie McGinn.
- McLellan weighed in before the game on the absence of Shane Doan from the Phoenix lineup as the Coyotes captain was about to serve the second night of his three-game suspension game for an elbow to the head of Dallas Stars forward Jamie Benn.
"I don't know Shane's impact with their team, I can only imagine it," McLellan said. "He's been there forever, he's a meat and potatoes type guy. But they've already played with out him and they've had some success."
But, McLellan added, he has more important things to focus on.
"We can't worry about who they have and who they don't have," he continued. "It's about who we have and how they do. It's about who we put in the lineup and what they give us."
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