Nico Sturm drank out of the Stanley Cup with the Colorado Avalanche in June. The next month, in what had to be another unforgettable day, Sturm took the Cup to his hometown of Augsburg, Germany, where he shared it with fans, family, and friends.
Sturm couldn’t possibly be any further removed from that moment than he is right now, as he and the rest of the San Jose Sharks woke up Wednesday as the NHL’s last-place team.
“It sucks,” Sturm said Tuesday night after the Sharks’ 5-2 loss to the New York Islanders, which dropped their record to 0-5-0. “I haven’t been on a losing team, I think, since my first year in juniors. It’s not really something I’m used to.
“I don’t like it.”
Five games into the NHL season and the Sharks have at times looked completely lost. They don’t have an identity, at least not one they play to on a consistent basis. They don’t know how to play with a lead, their top players aren’t scoring and they typically can’t afford to play from behind.
As staggering as it is that the Sharks have already allowed 12 second-period goals, and have lost leads in four of the five games they’ve played, it’s equally alarming that they have yet to score a goal in the third period.
Once they were down 3-2 late in the second period Tuesday after Islanders winger Oliver Wahlstrom scored the first of his two, it felt like it was close to over. Once Wahlstrom scored again 5:24 into the third period, there was next to no chance the Sharks were going to come back.
When you’ve scored eight times in five games, how can it feel any different?
“It’s going to take a lot of work physically and mentally to get out of the situation we’re in,” said Sharks coach David Quinn, who has yet to see his team have a third-period lead. “It’s frustrating.”
Few people, if any, expected the Sharks to be playoff contenders this season. General manager Mike Grier was honest about the direction when he was hired in July, and said the team was likely going to need to take a step back before it can go forward.
That meant being in the NHL draft lottery for at least one more season.
Still, it’s a surprise to see the Sharks start off this poorly.
Grier traded Brent Burns but made what seemed like positive moves to support his core players with the acquisition of some reliable veterans, like Sturm. As it stands right now, though, the Sharks will have about as good a chance as any team to win the No. 1 overall pick for the 2023 NHL Draft and select wunderkind Connor Bedard.
That’s obviously not on the minds of any Sharks players right now, as they get set to face the New York Rangers on Thursday in David Quinn’s return to Madison Square Garden. Quinn coached the Rangers from 2018 to 2021.
“We’ve got to accelerate the learning process, that’s for sure. Because we’ve got a tough game on Thursday night,” Quinn said. “At some point in time, losing’s got to hurt enough to the point where you’re going to accelerate the learning process, and that’s what we have to do.”
Quinn was asked if losing hurts enough right now for the Sharks.
“I think so,” he said. “But we’ll find out.”
Burns’ absence was always going to leave a massive void, and everyone right now is discovering how big that hole is.
Erik Karlsson and Mario Ferraro have three points each this season but the Sharks haven’t received a goal from their top-nine forward group in the last three games. After going 0-for-3 on the power play Tuesday, San Jose is now 1-for-19 with the man advantage this season.
If the Sharks’ top five or six-skill players aren’t scoring, the fallback options are limited. The fourth line of Sturm, Evgeny Svechnikov, and Jonah Gadjovich had more high-danger scoring chances than any other Sharks line Tuesday, per Natural Stat Trick, and accounted for both of San Jose’s goals.
That pretty much says it all.
“We’re finding ways to lose,” Sharks winger Timo Meier said Tuesday. “(The Islanders) are a good team, but I thought tonight we beat ourselves again, just like the last game (against Chicago). It’s early in the season, but that can’t happen, so it’s time for us to figure this out.”
After Thursday, the Sharks close their road trip with games against New Jersey on Saturday and Philadelphia on Sunday. Right now, incremental improvements aren’t enough.
“We need a win,” Quinn said. “We need to find a way to get a win. This can wear on you in a hurry and you can see it in our guys’ faces.”
“We don’t have a lot of time,” Sturm said. “The hole’s getting deeper and deeper and at some point, it’s just going be too late already.”
