No more California trips at least–Sharks 3, Red Wings 1

The Sharks put their seven game win streak on the line tonight against the Red Wings at home at HP Pavilion.

Dany Heatley scored his first goal of the game (21st of the season) at 3:51 of the first period after a shot from Ian White was initially stopped by Joey MacDonald. Heatley cleaned up the rebound with ease to give the Sharks the lead.

The Red Wings got a power play late in the first period and with Johan Franzen in front of Antti Niemi, Niklas Kronwall ripped a shot far post to seemingly tie the game. Key word: seemingly. The referee called the goal off, saying that Franzen had interfered with Niemi. The Wings must have been ticked off by this because they didn’t waste much time scoring on the power play. Mike Modano wound up for a slap shot from along the boards and Tomas Holmstrom deflected it past Niemi for the tie.

Follow the jump for the rest of the game and some 1:30 AM analysis.

In the second period, the Heatley added his second of the game off of a set-play off the face-off with Tomas Holmstrom in the box for hooking. Joe Thornton threw the puck wide intentionally off the face-off and Joe Pavelski was set up wide before the puck dropped to retrieve it. Pavelski got it and quickly threw it towards Heatley as the Red Wings’ PK unit collapsed towards Pavelski and Heatley redirected it past MacDonald for a 2-1 San Jose lead.

Late in the third period, the Sharks got a bit of a gift off one of the oddest goals you’ll see. Joey MacDonald went out to play the puck as Jonathan Ericsson and Patrick Marleau approached. MacDonald’s pass deflected off either Ericsson or Marleau (assuming Marleau since he was credited with the goal) and up over MacDonald and into the net. It was the summation of the night for the Red Wings and ended any real chance at a comeback.

The Wings head to Phoenix on Saturday to play the Coyotes. The Phoenix game is the last of the H2H2 Pledges at TPL.

• About the only exciting moments for Detroit fans in the first half of the first period was a pair of 2-on-1s while the Sharks were on the power play. Would have been nice to see the Wings get a shorty on those chances but it didn’t quite develop.
• The Sharks had a nice sustained pressure in the offensive zone late in the second period but fortunately for the Wings, the Sharks were unable to score. Unfortunately for the Wings, they couldn’t score themselves.
• Here’s where I’m at on the Franzen interference call: 1.) I guess it didn’t really matter because the Wings scored anyway 2.) I’m not sure it affected the outcome of the game all that much and 3.) I can see how the ref could have called it, but I also think Niemi had plenty of time to reset himself. In the end, the refs didn’t even come close to costing the Wings the game, shitty, inconsistent play in the offensive zone cost them the game.
• The defense played pretty well tonight I thought. They held the Sharks under their average shots on goal per game and did a great job backchecking and shutting down some scoring opportunities.
• THIS WIN FOR TEH SHARKZ WILL CATAPULT THEM OVER THE WINGS FOR ALL OF ETERNITY!!! LOL!!

  (I’m done)
  

• Joey MacDonald…poor poor Joey MacDonald. He played one hell of a game, despite essentially scoring on himself. He had a lot of big saves and was consistently in position all night. He got beaten twice on good plays but it was a very unfortunate outcome for him.
• I’m not going to lie, that set play off the face-off was pretty nice. Wings were completely caught off guard and for some reason paid no attention to Pavelski on the far side of the ice.
• Antti Niemi: how does he keep beating the Red Wings? I mean, come on.
• Weird stat of the night: Justin Abdelkader had 5 shots on goal, Henrik Zetterberg had 0.

Who was the Red Wings’ player of the game?