The San Jose Sharks had their four-game win streak snapped by the Calgary Flames on Thursday.
Despite winning the previous four, cracks in the Sharks’ system began to show. The biggest area where the Sharks need to improve is their breakout.
Simply put, there is no connection from defensemen to forwards. The forwards are flying the zone while the defense is either just trying to lift it out or doing too much.
A perfect example of this happened against the Minnesota Wild. John Klingberg tried to make a pointless move in the corner and turned the puck over. The Wild then stepped in for a mini-breakaway from the corner, but Yaroslav Askarov bailed out Klingberg.
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Via ESPN+
In the clip, you can see Adam Gaudette supporting Klingberg, but not giving him an outlet. At the same time, it isn’t all Klingberg’s fault, as the wingers are nowhere to be found, so a chip off the boards doesn’t appear to be an option either.
Per MoneyPuck.com, the San Jose Sharks are middle of the pack in giveaways at five-on-five. The Sharks have 247 giveaways, which is the 14th most in the league. 120 of those giveaways have occurred in the Sharks’ d-zone, which is the 13th most in the league.
48.5% of the Sharks’ giveaways occur in the defensive zone, ranking 14th in the league.
Against the Flames, the Sharks had 14 giveaways compared to Calgary’s 16. However, nine of the 14 giveaways happened in the San Jose Sharks’ zone.
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Dmitry Orlov had multiple bad plays where he just tossed a puck to the slot for a wide-open Flames player.
Askarov and Alex Nedeljkovic have had to be incredibly sharp for the Sharks as they were outshot during every game of the win streak.
Kraken 30-23 Sharks
Jets 33-28 Sharks
Panthers 39-23 Sharks
Wild 29-18 Sharks
Thursday night, the Sharks had nobody going. Lines were tossed into a blender, and even still, head coach Ryan Warsofsky didn’t like what he saw.
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“No. No one played very good tonight besides Asky,” Warsofsky said postgame.
The San Jose Sharks are practicing in Seattle on Friday, and it probably won’t be an easy one.
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