Sheng Peng
“I don’t want to see it ever like that.”
That’s what head coach Ryan Warsofsky said about overtime on Sunday, despite his San Jose Sharks winning 6-5 OT over the Minnesota Wild, thanks to a Macklin Celebrini strike.
But the victory was also thanks to Alex Wennberg, William Eklund, and Timothy Liljegren, who basically didn’t leave the ice for the first 3:47 of overtime, until Celebrini jumped on for Eklund to score the breakaway winner. Wennberg and Liljegren were on the ice the entire time.
Let’s not forget goalie Yaroslav Askarov too, who put in a gutsy effort to earn his first win of the season.
Of course, the Sharks got lucky too: Matt Boldy hit a post in the OT.
But here’s what the San Jose Sharks’ fatigued four did to hold off the Wild, in one of the most remarkable regular season OTs in recent NHL history.
Ex-AHL assistant coach Jack Han — subscribe to his Hockey Tactics Newsletter! — shared his thoughts too.
Wennberg, Celebrini, and Warsofsky also chimed in.
00:25 — Wennberg (21), as he often is, is in perfect defensive position, blocking a Kirill Kaprizov (97) centering pass to Marco Rossi (23).
However, Eklund (72) can’t corral the puck, an ominous sign for the Sharks.
“Minnesota changes [with] possession versus the more tired Sharks, which is how you gain an edge in OT,” Han said.
1:43 — Has fatigue set in? After sound defensive positioning has kept the Wild to the outside for most of a minute-and-a-half of OT, Brock Faber (7) beats Eklund to the net. Joel Eriksson Ek (14) passes through Wennberg, and Faber gets a down-low 2-on-1 tip. But Askarov to the rescue!
“Minnesota starts softening up the San Jose Sharks skaters, starting to get a second line change in,” Han said. “This scoring chance, the Wild waited a while for, due to the line change and wanting to be way fresher than San Jose before attacking the net.”
2:01 — Timothy Liljegren (37) has a big block on Kaprizov.
“Just live to fight another day,” Wennberg said. “When you get stuck out there, can’t get changes, instead of panicking, I feel like we did a good job to just hold them on the outside.”
2:20 — Wennberg and Eklund, summoning an extra gear, force Marcus Johansson (90) out of the zone, giving the San Jose Sharks momentary relief. Eklund is too tired to be very aggressive, but as Wennberg is trying to stay with Johansson, the young winger shades toward the puck carrier. In effect, with Wennberg behind him and Eklund below him, Johansson is “trapped” in the high corner and pushed out.
“Forcing Johansson out is good,” Han said, “but it exposes you to more speed on the re-entry. There’s no real solution, just a feature of 3-on-3 OT and being a tired defender.”
2:35 — While Wennberg and Eklund can’t stop a fresh Kaprizov, they at least make life hard for him coming down the wall, buying more time.
3:10 — “The San Jose Sharks don’t even try to recover the loose puck,” Han said. “Full zone coverage now. Survival mode.
“They were changing two, three times or something,” Wennberg said.
3:20 — Does Wennberg get away with a hook on Jared Spurgeon (46) rolling to the net?
“I don’t think so,” Wennberg said, sincerely.
Celebrini, meanwhile, is itching to jump on the ice, at least once going over the boards before coming back.
Typically, center Celebrini (71) would change for center Wennberg, but on the fly, and as OT drags, the San Jose Sharks coaches decide to get their best player on the ice for anyone, which ends up being winger Eklund.
When did the Sharks decide the unleash the Macklin?
“I had three minutes to think about it,” Warsofsky quipped. “That was just wanting to get [Celebrini] on the ice as quick as possible.”
“They just yelled at me to get on,” Celebrini said of the timing.
“Eky cheated a little bit,” Wennberg admitted. “Obviously, we gave up a 3-on-2 there but got a little bit lucky.”
“It was just kind of instinct,” Celebrini said, of beating Jesper Wallstedt. “Wasn’t really thinking about it.”
3:47 — The 19-year-old made sure Wennberg and company’s work in the trenches didn’t go to waste. Speaking of the trenches, Wennberg never completed his change.
“Barely made it over the blueline,” he said, smiling. “Obviously, a little bit tired.”
“The Wild win this nine times out of 10,” Han said. “Just bad luck for Minnesota. They had the Sharks dead to rights with how they managed their line changes.”
“You need a little luck in this league as well,” Wennberg said.