Scoring Chances: Game 8 vs. Calgary

Complete scoring chance summary

On-ice scoring chances for and against

Team scoring chance totals

Head-to-head scoring chances

• I think the chance numbers on Demers both do and don’t tell the story of his performance last night. On the one hand, he made several visible gaffes including coughing up the puck in the defensive zone to Sean Monahan for a breakaway with a little over eight minutes remaining in the third. But he also moved the puck well at times and made good reads in the offensive zone on numerous occasions to put the Sharks in the position to create chances that didn’t always materialize. He’s essentially the team’s top puck-mover on the back end with Dan Boyle out, which is a lot to ask of a player who has been more down than up over the past two seasons. You kind of have to take the good with the bad.
• What’s encouraging is that the power play had a hell of a night in Boyle’s absence, with the Flames more than willing to give the Sharks chance after chance to hone their man-advantage skills. The sequence that led to Pavelski’s second goal was just flawlessly executed.
• Logan Couture’s line drew Calgary’s de facto top line of Curtis Glencross, Mikael Backlund and Lee Stempniak and essentially played them to a draw. That’s fine, but you’d like to see more even-strength offense from that trio. Martin Havlat is apparently getting closer to a return; slotting him into Kennedy’s current spot, moving Kennedy into Wingels’ current spot and playing Wingels on the fourth line would instantly improve three lines at once. Which is scary considering how good this team already is.