
EL SEGUNDO – Much has been made of the Pacific Division standings this season, and for good reason.
The stat that best illustrates why is the Sharks, currently in second place at 16-15-2 and 34 points, would be in seventh place in the Central, seventh in the Atlantic, and sixth in the Metropolitan.
The Los Angeles Kings (20-10-2, 42 points) are the one club that has emerged as perhaps the sole legitimate Stanley Cup contender from the Pacific, at least by the look of things so far. They own an eight-point lead on San Jose with one game in hand and a head-to-head meeting at Staples Center on the horizon Tuesday.
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Although the Sharks have trudged along through their first 33, getting to within six points of their biggest rival would not only leave them feeling good about their game headed into a four-day break for Christmas, it would see them cap their peripatetic five-game road trip with a very respectable 3-1-1 mark.
The Sharks started the trip with wins in Montreal and Toronto, lost to Ottawa, and dropped a 4-3 overtime decision to the Blackhawks on Sunday.
“L.A. is a team that is above us, [and] we want to hunt them down,” Pete DeBoer said. “I’ve liked how we’ve played on this road trip. I think we could have won all four games. … But, the difference between 3-1-1 and .500 is a big difference.”
Martin Jones said: “We want to try and close the gap on these guys a little bit. It’s another big division game.”
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Despite being shorthanded against the Blackhawks with forwards Joel Ward and Melker Karlsson both late scratches due to injury, the Sharks hung with the defending Stanley Cup champs and even had a third period lead before surrendering on Jonathan Toews’ score in overtime.
Captain Joe Pavelski has paced the club on the road trip with seven points in four games, but was especially effective against the Blackhawks. He scored a go-ahead goal in the second period, his team-leading 16th, and on the postgame summary his 11 hits was the most eye-catching number.
“That must have been a typo,” Pavelski said with a smirk.
DeBoer knows it wasn’t.
“I thought he was excellent. There’s no doubt he was our engine last night. He had 11 hits, he ran [Brent] Seabrook over, won a lot of puck battles. … We’ve come to expect that out of him, but there’s no doubt he was very, very good.”
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From the Kings’ perspective, it will be their first game back at home after a six-game, 13-day trip. They’ll use the season opener, a 5-1 Sharks win at Staples Center on Oct. 7, as inspiration for the only other game between the two clubs in Southern California this season.
“I’m excited about tomorrow, you want to end on a good note and have a good taste in your mouth going into the Christmas break,” Milan Lucic said. “The last time we had them at home, it was probably our worst game of the season. We can use that as motivation.”
Just like the Sharks, Los Angeles has played its fair share of games outside of the Pacific. The Kings are 4-4-0 in their division, while the Sharks are 3-4-1.
Tuesday will be the first of five straight against the Pacific for the Kings, giving them a chance to pull even further away from the pack.
Conversely…
“Those are ways that the teams behind you can gain ground, is those divisional games,” Lucic said. “As good as we’ve been out of our division, we need to be good in our division. They’re important games.”
Jonathan Quick said: “You can’t really look at big picture, you’re just trying to go one at a time here. We’ve got a division game tomorrow night against those guys in our building, so everybody knows the importance of that game and getting two points.”