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The San Jose Sharks fell 6-3 to the Buffalo Sabres last night in the final game of their road trip.
Evgeny Svechnikov entered the lineup for the Sharks, with Noah Gregor as a healthy scratch, while Aaron Dell got his second start of the season.
After some good chances were exchanged early on, the Sabres opened the scoring on a power play midway through the opening frame, as Tage Thompson took a pass to wire a one-timer past Aaron Dell. However, the Sharks tied it back up soon after, as Luke Kunin was able to rush to keep a puck in the Sabres’ end, before feeding Nick Bonino, who beat Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen for his first goal of the season. Then under three minutes later, San Jose capitalized on a power play of their own, with Kevin Labanc picking a corner to beat Luukkonen, putting the Sharks ahead through 20 minutes.
The Sabres tied the game pretty much as soon as the second period began though, with J.J. Peterka taking a stretch pass from Dylan Cozens and scoring off a shot that Dell couldn’t handle. Then only a couple minutes later, Jeff Skinner came in on a rush and outwaited just about everybody, beating Dell, who had been run into by a diving Nick Cicek. Things didn’t get any better as the period went along, with San Jose giving up 13 shots, and then later in the frame, Jack Quinn made a nice move to get the puck around Radim Simek, beating Dell with a nice shot to extend Buffalo’s lead.
Quinn then scored his second goal of the game midway through the third period, taking a pass from Dylan Cozens on a rush to score. The Sharks did respond right away, as Oskar Lindblom scored from the side of the net to make it a two-goal game again, but Alex Tuch ended up burying an empty netter later, leading to a 6-3 loss for the Sharks.
So after shutting out the Montreal Canadiens to open their four-game road trip, San Jose dropped three straight, picking up just two of a possible eight points overall. Once again, the Sharks were able to get an early lead yesterday, but squandered it pretty quickly.
San Jose’s penalty kill struggled once again as well, killing off just two of Buffalo’s four man advantages. Between last night and the loss to Ottawa on Friday, the Sharks allowed five power play goals on just nine opportunities.
The Sharks have now won just one of their last seven games, and it’s a little tough to find a ton of positives from the season so far. Only a third of the way into the season, most of the anticipation for the rest of the year rests in which players may or may not be traded away at the deadline.
They’ll be back in action on Wednesday, when they face the Vancouver Canucks.
OTHER ARTICLES FROM DECEMBER
Sharks come up short against Maple Leafs, fall 3-1
Sharks give up three power play goals, lose 5-2 to Senators 
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