San Jose Sharks
Sturm Clears the Air: ‘Much more confident in this group than…in the previous years’
Nico Sturm wanted to clear the air, make sure that he wasn’t taken out of context.
Sturm had an eye-catching quote after the San Jose Sharks’ 8-3 loss to the Winnipeg Jets on Friday, their fifth straight to start the season. He was asked what was behind the Sharks’ recent slow starts.
“That’s on each individual. Honestly, we’re professionals. You gotta do what you got to do to prepare for the game,” Nico Sturm said. “We’ve had team skates in the morning. We’ve had optionals. It really makes no difference. You got to be ready when the puck drops, whether you go to bed at 9 PM the night before, or stay up to 3 playing video games, like nobody really cares, as long as you’re ready.”
Of course, the San Jose Sharks weren’t ready to start either Thursday or Friday’s loss.
“It’s taken us half the game, both in Chicago [on Thursday] and tonight, to seem even remotely ready,” he said.
Was Sturm talking about a larger issue for the now 0-5-2 Sharks, a lack of preparation the night before a game?
San Jose Sharks head coach Ryan Warsofsky shot that down with a terse “No” when asked after the Jets’ rout.
San Jose Hockey Now followed up with Sturm on Monday.
“It was just a figure of speech,” Sturm insisted.
“I don’t know if guys play video games,” he said, before adding, “Nobody asks what you do away from the rink, as long as you show up and you’re ready to play the game. I don’t care if you go home and slap down 20 beers but if you come ready to play, go ahead.”
Sturm says he was just expressing frustration that the Sharks hadn’t been starting on time, he wasn’t pointing a finger at anybody or anything in particular.
Another area of frustration for Sturm?
After the Chicago and Winnipeg losses, Sturm said, “It felt a lot like last year, these last two games on the bench again.”
On Monday, Sturm stressed the importance of turning the page, “We don’t want to talk about last year or the previous two years, because I think that it’s a whole new team. We’ve got 12 new guys, we got new coaches, so there’s really not that much connection to the previous years.”
The San Jose Sharks keep losing, but Sturm is keeping the faith that better days are ahead this season.
“There’s gonna be still some frustrating nights, right? Nobody in here was expecting us to all of a sudden go to a Stanley Cup contender overnight,” he said. “But we got to learn. We still got to learn how to win. That’s the biggest thing. We still haven’t learned that, but we will. I’m much more confident. Let’s put it this way. Much more confident in this group than maybe at this point in the previous years.”