San Jose Sharks get shutout by Connor Ingram in 1-0 loss to Arizona Coyotes
By Conor Power
It turned out that the San Jose Sharks road scoring woes were not completely cured when they ventured to the East Coast. Connor Ingram shuts the door on the Sharks as sloppy puck management, poor discipline, and general wastefulness come back to show the flaws within the ranks of this roster. There were silver linings, but this was not a great team performance.
Arizona would open the scoring with five minutes left in the second period. Mattias Maccelli would smack a rebound home off a point shot from J.J. Moser. San Jose was now behind in a game where scoring chances had been few and far between. Now, the offense would need to improve if the Sharks were going to get back into this game.
William Eklund plays a give-and-go with Luke Kunin. Kunin gets in behind the Coyotes defense but is stopped by Connor Ingram. Eklund deposits the rebound past Ingram before tucking it home. Arizona decided to challenge the play for goaltender interference, and the officials determined that Kunin's skate impacted Ingram's ability to stop the puck on the Eklund rebound. It kept the score 1-0 with 12:20 left in the game. This was just the wrong call. Ingram initiates contact before Kunin reaches the crease.
Fabian Zetterlund managed to draw three Coyotes to him as he drove the net. As it bounced around, Mikael Granlund was able to settle it down and put it home to tie the game up for real this time! That was until the Arizona Coyotes challenged this one for offside. This one was also taken off the board as the Sharks could not buy a bounce in this one with two goals called back by challenges.
With Kaapo Kahkonen on the bench and three and a half minutes left in the game, the Sharks started to push for the tying goal of the game. Sustained pressure putting the Coyotes to the blade, San Jose couldn't solve Connor Ingram. A 1-0 game at Mullet Arena saw the Sharks fall back into their previous ways, with the inability to score on the road biting the team once again. It was not a bad performance, but the result headlines why this team needs to endure its rebuild.