San Jose Sharks Look to Ground the Winnipeg Jets in Manitoba

WINNIPEG, MB - FEBRUARY 5: Tomas Hertl #48 of the San Jose Sharks and goaltender Connor Hellebuyck #37 of the Winnipeg Jets get themselves untangled from the net following a collision during third period action at the Bell MTS Place on February 5, 2019 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The Sharks defeated the Jets 3-2 in overtime. (Photo by Darcy Finley/NHLI via Getty Images)
WINNIPEG, MB - FEBRUARY 5: Tomas Hertl #48 of the San Jose Sharks and goaltender Connor Hellebuyck #37 of the Winnipeg Jets get themselves untangled from the net following a collision during third period action at the Bell MTS Place on February 5, 2019 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The Sharks defeated the Jets 3-2 in overtime. (Photo by Darcy Finley/NHLI via Getty Images)

The San Jose Sharks are coming off a stellar 3 – 0 shutout victory over the Minnesota Wild on Monday night. They’re headed to Manitoba for the second night of back to back games to face-off versus the Winnipeg Jets.

The San Jose Sharks dominated the Wild in St. Paul and got out of there relatively unscathed. The boys were lead by a sensational performance in-goal from netminder Martin Jones. However Team Teal’s next opponent the Winnipeg Jets have a lot more fire power than that desperate Wild team.

The Winnipeg Jets just like the San Jose Sharks are legitimate Stanley Cup contender.  Both of these teams are fighting for first place in their respected divisions in the western conferences.

That being said the these two teams are on different trajectories since the trade deadline. The Jets have struggled mightily lately, with a 4 -5 – 1 record in their previous 10 games. While at the same time the Sharks are red-hot winning 5 straight, going 7 – 2 – 1 over their last 10.

During Team Teal’s 5 game winning streak they’ve been playing phenomenally in just about every phase of the game. They’ve posted a nice 69% GF% at all strengths, have limited the amount of scoring opportunities and high danger chances to a minimum, and have a surprising 93.43% save percentage, per naturalstattrick. The San Jose Sharks have been able to pull this off without both Erik Karlsson and Evander Kane.

Tonight has the potential to be full of milestones for a few of Sharks veteran skaters. Joe Thornton is still currently tied with Stan Mikita at 14th all time in total points with 1467. Jumbo has played very well lately so don’t be surprised if we see him pass the hockey legend in front of the hostile Winnipeg Jets crowd.

Center Logan Couture has an opportunity to join the 500 point club if he gets on the score sheet tonight. Cooch has 62 points on the year and has 9 in his last 10 games for the San Jose Sharks.  The Winnipeg Jets would love to poop on the potential party that Team Teal might be throwing if either of these two reach these achievements this evening.

The San Jose Sharks will ice the same lineup they did against the Minnesota Wild during the first night of this back-to-back.

San Jose Sharks

Forward Combinations

Timo Meier ~ Logan Couture ~ Joe Pavelski

Joonas Donskoi ~ Tomas Hertl ~ Gustav Nyquist

Marcus Sorensen~ Joe Thornton ~ Kevin Labanc

Micheal Haley ~ Barclay Goodrow ~ Melker Karlsson

Defensive Pairings

Radim Simek ~ Brent Burns

Marc-Edouard ~ Tim Heed

Brendan Dillon ~ Justin Braun

Goalie
Projected Starter ~ Aaron Dell

Backup ~ Martin Jones

Winnipeg Jets

Forward Combinations

Patrick Laine ~ Mark Scheifele ~ Blake Wheeler

Kyle Connor ~ Kevin Hayes ~ Nikolaj Ehlers

Brandon Tanev ~ Adam Lowry ~ Bryan Little

Mathieu Perreault ~ Andrew Copp ~ Jack Roslovic

Defensive Pairings

Nathan Beaulieu ~ Jacob Trouba

Dmitry Kulikov ~ Tyler Myers

Ben Chiarot ~ Sami Niku

Goalie

Starter: Connor Hellebuyck

Backup: Laurent Brossoit

Puck drop for tonight’s game is at 5:00 PM PT live at the Bell MTS Place. The game is televised on NBCSCA and the audio is streamed via the San Jose Sharks official app courtesy of 98.5 KFOX.

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