{"id":537966,"date":"2026-04-03T05:31:44","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T05:31:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/537966\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T05:31:44","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T05:31:44","slug":"sharks-win-4th-straight-to-improve-playoff-hopes-beating-the-maple-leafs-4-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/537966\/","title":{"rendered":"Sharks win 4th straight to improve playoff hopes, beating the Maple Leafs 4-1"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE, Calif. — – Zack Ostapchuk<\/a> scored his first goal in nearly three months and the San Jose Sharks<\/a> beat the Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a> 4-1 on Thursday night for their fourth straight victory.<\/p>\n

Collin Graf<\/a>, William Eklund<\/a> and Adam Gaudette<\/a> also scored and Alex Nedeljkovic<\/a> made 18 saves.<\/p>\n

San Jose, which had the worst record in the NHL last season, is fighting for a wild-card spot in the crowded Western Conference. The Sharks haven’t made the playoffs since 2018-19.<\/p>\n

Sharks star Macklin Celebrini<\/a>, who had nine points in his previous three games, was scoreless on three shots.<\/p>\n

John Tavares<\/a> scored a power-play goal for Toronto. The Maple Leafs have lost two of three on a four-game trip.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

Maple Leafs: At Los Angeles on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Sharks: Host Nashville on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

——<\/p>\n

AP NHL: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/nhl<\/a>br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE, Calif. — – Zack Ostapchuk scored his first goal in nearly three months and the San…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":537967,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5106],"tags":[61707,266,5,20,5172,4,168,66,31,5171],"class_list":{"0":"post-537966","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-maple-leafs","8":"tag-61707","9":"tag-espn","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-maple-leafs","12":"tag-mapleleafs","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-san-jose-sharks","15":"tag-toronto","16":"tag-toronto-maple-leafs","17":"tag-torontomapleleafs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116339139599068345","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/537966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=537966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/537966\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/537967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=537966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=537966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=537966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}