Sharks Locker Room: ‘Same Old BS’

Why would you call a timeout down 7-1 with 12 minutes to go?

We, the media, didn’t ask San Jose Sharks head coach David Quinn that particular question after their 7-2 loss to the New Jersey Devils. Instead, we asked the what, as in what was the message to the team during the timeout?

To a man – we spoke with Nico Sturm, alternate captain Mario Ferraro, Kaapo Kahkonen, and Quinn afterwards – they declined to elaborate.

“We gotta play better,” was all Sturm offered.

“It was a little bit more than that,” Quinn said. “I’ll keep it to myself and the team.”

The why matters too though, so I’ll hazard a guess.

The San Jose Sharks still have 25 games left this season. You want to say that’s 25 games for players to prove themselves, but honestly, the team is 15-37-5, so it’s more likely 25 games that they’ll embarrass themselves.

You can’t have that. Simply, the captain still must steer the ship.

This team, with their talent level, which will likely decline after the Mar. 8 Trade Deadline, how do you think they’ll perform if the coaches and players all take their hands off the wheel?

Well, we’ve seen this shipwreck already.

A 10-1 loss to the Vancouver Canucks, then a 10-2 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins in November, to cap off a 0-10-1 start to the season. A 7-1 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs in December, to bookend a 12-game losing streak.

And now?

“You just keep making [bad] plays and you don’t care about the consequences, you’re going to get a 7-2 loss,” Quinn said.

Look, I understand that losing is good for the No. 1 goal for the San Jose Sharks, which is the No. 1 pick of the 2024 Draft.

But you still have to have standards, be it during Game 57 of the season or Game 82.

You need to set those standards for the youngsters that you hope are the foundation of the next Sharks’ playoff team, from William Eklund to Fabian Zetterlund to Henry Thrun.

You need to set those standards, even in a rebuild season, so the product might be worth paying for, so you won’t completely offend the remaining fans.

You need to set those standards, even it just means losing 4-2 instead of 7-2.

If you pack it in with 25 games to go, what’s the message to the players, to the NHL, to the fans?

Not knowing the timeout message – the point is, you have to have a message for your team. You have to keep fighting.

I don’t envy the challenge for Quinn and his staff to close this campaign: Compared to the rest of the NHL, you’re not talented. You’re in last place, with no hope of making the playoffs. With the Trade Deadline looming, there’s more reason for players to play for themselves than the team that they’re probably leaving.

It’s a battle against, at least in team sports, the worst of human nature.

“You’re in a situation like we are,” Quinn mused. “This is the ultimate team sport, and all of a sudden, you don’t play the ultimate team game. This is not a sport you can do anything on your own.”

Quinn and the Sharks have bounced back with a semblance of team spirit and competitiveness after their 0-10-1 start. The 12-game losing streak. Can they do it again?

Nico Sturm

Sturm, on what happened to the San Jose Sharks tonight:

We fed right into what makes them good. They are a good skill team that feeds off transition, off turnovers on both bluelines.

If you grab the lead against a team that plays that way, then you give yourself a really good chance because they’re gonna give you chances. They play a high-risk game. It was just completely unnecessary for us to play the way that we did.

They took complete advantage of the way we played.

Sturm, on Quinn’s message during the timeout:

We gotta play better.

Sturm, on if players are perhaps chasing offense with the Trade Deadline approaching:

I can’t read into other people’s heads. But I think that there’s people that are watching from upstairs and they see those mistakes too. So I don’t really see how making high-risk plays the whole game will give you any benefit with the Trade Deadline coming up.

Mario Ferraro

Ferraro, on Quinn’s message during the timeout:

That’s between us. I think you guys can probably [figure it out] yourself.

Ferraro, on being on the other side of yet another rout:

Our goal is to have teams come out of our building, win or lose, say that was a hard team to play against. Like [Sturm] said we weren’t hard enough to play against. We knew coming in that they have a lot of skill and a ton of speed. The way we really wanted to stop that was just being physical, being hard, being tough on their skill.

We tried to play their game tonight and that hurt us.

Ferraro, moving forward, on how the San Jose Sharks can keep the game from going off the tracks:

I wish I had the formula to do that. It’s a collective confidence in the group, something we got to build and build it with each other.

That’s been kind of our issue all year. We give up one goal and then rapidly the next one comes. We have to find a way to weather [it], get back to even-keel, and then we’ll figure it out from there.

We let it snowball effect. It’s been a huge problem with our group this year.

Kaapo Kahkonen

Kahkonen, on Mackenzie Blackwood’s injury:

I don’t know what’s going on. I haven’t…But hopefully, it’s not too bad. Hopefully, it’s something that goes away quick. And he’s back soon. He’s a great teammate, great goalie.

David Quinn

Blackwood is lower-body injury, they’ll have a better idea tomorrow

— Sheng Peng (@Sheng_Peng) February 28, 2024

Quinn, moving forward, on how the San Jose Sharks can keep the game from going off the tracks:

Just stop passing the other team the puck. We did it over and over and over.

Our puck play was…bad.

You just keep making plays and you don’t care about the consequences, you’re going to get a 7-2 loss.

Quinn, on if his timeout message was basically just to play better:

It was a little bit more than that. I’ll keep it to myself and the team.

Quinn, on if the third goal, scored by Kevin Bahl, was the turning point:

No, not really. I thought the whole second period, they get a breakaway, they get a 2-on-1, just same old bullshit.

Quinn, on if players are perhaps chasing offense with the Trade Deadline approaching:

Our record. Deadline. All of a sudden, you’re in a situation like we are. This is the ultimate team sport, and all of a sudden, you don’t play the ultimate team game. This is not a sport you can do anything on your own. That can creep in when you’re in the situation we’re in and when you get the Trade Deadline coming up.