The San Jose Sharks nearly saw their road trip end on another stirring note.
The Sharks sent their game Sunday with the Vegas Golden Knights into overtime as Mike Hoffman scored with 38.2 seconds left to tie the game 4-4.
But after a scoreless overtime, Kevin Labanc and Mikael Granlund could not capitalize on their shootout attempts, and Golden Knights forwards Jonathan Marchessault and Jack Eichel finished theirs to hand the Sharks a 5-4 loss at T-Mobile Arena.
Hoffman’s marking the fourth time the Sharks have scored a 6-on-5 goal in their last three games.
Hoffman’s goal was his second of the game and Mario Ferraro and Calen Addison both added one goal. Granlund had two assists for the Sharks.
After Ferraro scored his first goal of the season 29 seconds into the first period, the Sharks (8-18-2) allowed goals to Marchessault and Chandler Stephenson in the second period and Brayden McNabb to fall behind 3-1.
Hoffman and Addison both scored goals in the third period — sandwiched around a second one from Marchessault — with Addison’s goal coming with 3:45 left in regulation time.
The Sharks announced right before Sunday’s game that both forward William Eklund and defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic would not play. Eklund has a lower-body injury and Vlasic missed the game for personal reasons.
Eklund was on the Sharks’ team bus that arrived at T-Mobile Arena but missed his first game this season, and it was not immediately clear how serious his injury was. Givani Smith took Eklund’s spot in the lineup and Kevin Labanc replaced Eklund on the Sharks’ top line with Tomas Hertl and Alexander Barabanov.
The Sharks play the Central Division-leading Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday at home.
At the start of the second period, Anthony Duclair was injured as he was hit in the jaw by the left shoulder of Golden Knights forward Keegan Kolesar right after the faceoff at center ice. Duclair didn’t play the rest of the second period and the Sharks announced at the start of the third period that the winger would not return.
The Sharks had a mantra going into Sunday night’s game against the Golden Knights: turn a good road trip into a great one.
The Sharks went 1-2-0 to start the trip, with losses to the Boston Bruins and New York Rangers sandwiched around a win over the New Jersey Devils. Then came two consecutive comeback victories, as the Sharks erased a three-goal deficit in the third period before beating the New York Islanders 5-4 last Tuesday.
Two days later, the Sharks fell behind by four goals in the second period to the Detroit Red Wings and scored four in response before the second intermission. San Jose then fell behind by a goal with less than seven minutes left in regulation time, but with Kaapo Kahkonen pulled. tied the game on Tomas Hertl’s goal with 89 seconds to go.
Mikael Granlund then scored in overtime for a stirring 6-5 Sharks victory.
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“We want to continue to play good hockey and we want to continue to improve in the areas we’ve improved in, and tighten a few things up in areas that have hurt us where we’ve given up too many goals,” Sharks coach David Quinn said before Sunday’s game. “It’s nice to score but you don’t have to create offense and sacrifice defense. We’ve just got to be a little bit smarter in certain areas and not have the breakdowns we’ve had.
“Overall, I know it may sound nuts, … but I thought we played a pretty good defensive game against Detroit.”
