Goaltending, special teams come up huge for Sharks in win over Winnipeg Jets

SAN JOSE – William Eklund scored a power-play goal with 4:51 left in regulation time to help lift the San Jose Sharks to a 2-1 win over the Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday at SAP Center.

Eklund took a pass from Mikael Granlund and ripped a one-timer past Jets goalie Laurent Brossoit for his seventh goal of the season. Granlund’s assist extended his point streak to six games as the Sharks improved to 4-1-1 this month.

Goalie Mackenzie Blackwood finished with 36 saves, including eight while shorthanded as the Sharks were 5-for-5 on the penalty kill, which included killing off penalties to Henry Thrun and Mike Hoffman in the third period.

The Sharks had given up a power-play goal in five of their previous six games and entered Tuesday with the 31st-ranked penalty-killing unit in the NHL at 71.9 percent.

The Sharks went 3-2-1 on their road trip that started Nov. 30 and ended Sunday with a shootout loss to the Vegas Golden Knights at T-Mobile Arena.

Center Nico Sturm was injured in the third period on a play along the boards inside the Sharks blue line as he collided with a Jets player.

San Jose coach David Quinn was hoping the trip could galvanize his players for another six-game stretch before the Christmas break. Between now and Dec. 23, San Jose faces Arizona twice and Colorado, Los Angeles, and Vancouver once. All of those teams were in a playoff spot as of Tuesday morning.

“We’ve just got to take the next step defensively, but I think we have taken a step the last two games,” Quinn said Tuesday morning. “More commitment to playing defense and not giving up a crazy amount of chances. We’ve got to continue with that trend and we don’t have to sacrifice offense to play good defense.”

Before Tuesday, the Sharks were 0-2-1 in their first games back at home after a road trip. But they came out with plenty of energy in the opening five minutes of the first period, outshooting Winnipeg 12-1.

Bailey then scored his first goal in a Sharks uniform at the 9:17 mark of the first, as he took a pretty pass from Mike Hoffman and beat Jets goalie Laurent Brossoit with a wrist shot. It was Bailey’s sixth career NHL goal and his first since March 10, 2018 when he was 22 and with the Buffalo Sabres. Bailey, now 28, has five points in eight games with the Sharks this season.

The Jets got that back at the 16:09 mark of the first, as ex-Shark Brenden Dillon’s shot from the point got through traffic and past Blackwood for his fifth goal of the season.

NOTE: The Sharks activated forward Luke Kunin off of injured reserve on Tuesday and placed defenseman Matt Benning on IR. Quinn said before the game that while Kunin was lobbying to play against the Jets, he wouldn’t be in the lineup. But Kunin took pregame warmups and started the game on a line with Filip Zadina and Kevin Labanc.

Kunin’s last game came on Nov. 30 in Boston. Benning (lower body) last played on Dec. 3 against the New York Rangers. Over the weekend, Quinn termed Benning’s status as more week-to-week than day to day.