After starting the season with a big win over the rival Los Angeles Kings, the Sharks will now return to SAP Center to face their other southern California nemesis. This will be the Ducks‘ season opener, and as such the Sharks have a chance to spoil the first game of the season for both their California rivals.

The Sharks seemed to have the Ducks’ number last year, winning four out of their five meetings, (with their only loss coming in overtime), and outscoring them 24-11. Hopefully the Sharks can pick up right where they left off.

The Ducks main acquisition this offseason was aging defenseman Kevin Bieksa, moving them one step closer to being an older, even more hateable version of the 2011 Canucks. The one I would watch, though, is center Mike Santorelli, who was signed to a one year deal after having a solid season on a terrible Maple Leafs team.

Tale Of The Tape

	@
0-0-0	Record	1-0-0
N/A	Rank	Tied for 1st in the Pacific
N/A	Score-Adj. Fenwick	59.1
N/A	PDO	1.106
N/A	PP%	25%
N/A	PK%	100%

7:30PM PDT – SAP Center, San Jose California
TV: PRIME, FS-SD, CSN-CA
Radio: 98.5 KFOX, anaheimducks.com
Know Your Enemy: Anaheim Calling

Projected Sharks Lineup:

Joonas Donskoi – Joe Thornton – Joe Pavelski
Patrick Marleau – Logan Couture – Joel Ward
Matt Nieto – Tomas Hertl – Tommy Wingels
Barclay Goodrow – Chris Tierney – Mike Brown
Marc-Edouard Vlasic – Justin Braun
Paul Martin – Brent Burns
Brenden Dillon – Matt Tennyson
Martin Jones

Projected Ducks Lineup:

Carl Hagelin – Ryan Getzlaf – Chris Stewart
Jiri Sekac – Rickard Rackell – Corey Perry
Andrew Cogliano – Ryan Kesler – Jakob Silfverberg
Patrick Maroon – Shawn Horcoff – Mike Santorelli
Hampus Lindholm – Kevin Bieksa
Cam Fowler – Simon Despres
Clayton Stoner – Sami Vatanen
Frederik Andersen

Last Meeting:

The Sharks won the last regular season meeting between the two teams by a score of 6-3. The Ducks won a preseason matchup between the two 5-1 last week, but we don’t have highlights for that.

Storylines:

• Jakob Silfverberg will be playing tonight, in his first game back after being hit by Raffi Torres one week ago.
• Sharks’ coach Peter DeBoer is going with the same lineup tonight as he did Wednesday night. Why mess with success, right?
• Marc-Edouard Vlasic is going to become the franchise leader in games played for defenseman tonight with 672 under his belt.