The Sharks know that something has to change.
The St. Louis Blues owned them during the regular season, winning all four games and outscoring San Jose 11-3. In two games in St. Louis, the NHL's stingiest defense kept the Sharks off the scoreboard altogether.
So what does No. 7-seed San Jose need to do differently if it hopes to upset No. 2-seed St. Louis in their first-round Stanley Cup playoff series that opens Thursday at the Scottrade Center?
"I can give you a long list of about 15 things that need to be better," coach Todd McLellan said after his team's practice Monday.
And what's at the top of that list?
"The understanding of how they play," McLellan said. "If we understand what their mindset is, how they play -- and we do, we just have to accept it and then counter it -- we'll be better off."
More specifically?
"Limited opportunities against, very few outnumbered rushes ... very strong penalty kill, relying on their goaltender," the Sharks coach said. "We have to play our game -- but play it understanding what they're doing."
What the Blues do, of course, is stick to their coach's game plan, and Ken Hitchcock has stifled NHL teams from behind a lot of benches over the years. San Jose, in fact, has had two postseason encounters with Hitchcock with no success, as the Sharks were eliminated by his Dallas Stars in 1998 and 2000.
Hitchcock took over the Blues 13 games into this season and guided them
to a 43-15-11 record by imposing a system that relies heavily on a strong forecheck to force other teams into making mistakes. Goalies Jaroslav Halak and Brian Elliott, meanwhile, were stellar, allowing only 155 non-shootout goals all season, the fewest since the NHL went to an 82-game schedule.
It might not make for exciting hockey -- in fact, San Jose's two losses at the Scottrade Center were among the more challenging games to watch this season -- but it does make for winning hockey.
The Sharks point out that while they lost four games to the Blues this season, that 11-3 goal differential isn't as bad as it first appears. Three St. Louis goals came with a two-man advantage and two others with a one-man edge, so improved discipline alone would go a long way. Two other St. Louis goals went into an empty net.
There are other reasons to think the outcome might be different when the teams meet in the playoffs. Top-six forward Marty Havlat, who missed three of the games with injuries, is healthy. And the Sharks have been playing some of their best hockey lately, going 7-2 over the final nine games of the regular season.
But San Jose knows if it is to have any success, it must figure out a way to break that St. Louis forecheck that can pin a team in its own end by pressuring the Sharks defensemen against the end boards.
Logan Couture makes it clear the responsibility goes beyond those on the blue line.
"We have to break out well," he said. "Our 'd' are good at getting back to pucks. We've got to get the center and the two wings down there to support them, break out of our end, get through the neutral zone and then play in their end."
Marc-Edouard Vlasic sees the need for the Sharks to apply the golden rule on ice.
"They play a hard game -- up and down the ice, physical, pucks to the net," the Sharks defenseman said. "We've got to match that. If they're going to do it to us, we've got to do it to them."
Vlasic's defense partner, Dan Boyle, also mentioned the need for physical play.
"They're a big, fast, physical team. We consider ourselves that, too, but we're going to have to earn our ice and our space out there. They're not going to give it to us," he said. "In any playoffs, you want to wear teams down. Your hits that you give out in games 1 and 2 will probably be felt in games 5, 6 and 7."
Like any team in its situation, the Sharks note that when the playoffs begin, regular-season records mean nothing.
"Everybody has zeros on the board now and everybody starts fresh," captain Joe Thornton said. "I think that's the way you've got to look at it."
Still, in a perverse way, McLellan was able to find a little comfort in the way things went during the regular season.
"We didn't play well against this team," he said, "and that could be a good thing for us. We haven't played to our capabilities against this team."
For more on the Sharks, see David Pollak's Working the Corners blog at blogs.mercurynews.com/sharks.
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