Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Sharks hang on in a classic Game 7, beat Red Wings 3-2 and move on to West finals

Joe Thornton

It’s only fitting that a series that saw such greatness out of both San Jose and Detroit through each of their three wins saw a Game 7 worthy of representing the rest of the series with the sixth one-goal game of the seven game series. The six one goal games made this matchup the closest in NHL history.

Ultimately the Sharks were able to avoid joining an ignominious group of teams through history to lose a series after blowing a 3-0 series lead, winning Game 7 3-2 over Detroit and moving on to the Western Conference finals against Vancouver.

Ultimately, the game was won in the first period for the Sharks as they were able to jump out quickly on the Red Wings forcing the Wings to defend early and putting them back on their heels. That plan worked out well for the Sharks as they were able to get a power play goal from Devin Setoguchi just over 12 minutes into the game followed up by a snipe of a goal from Logan Couture to send the Sharks into intermission with a 2-0 lead.

As it’s gone all series long, the Wings were down but not out as they were able to cut the lead to one thanks to Henrik Zetterberg converting on a 3-on-2 break to put one past Antti Niemi (38 saves). While the Sharks were still doing their part to keep Detroit held back, the Wings started to push play more and Zetterberg’s tally changed the pace.

The third period set the stage for an incredible finish and it did not disappoint as one embattled San Jose Shark turned out to come up big. Patrick Marleau scored with under eight minutes to play in the period after a net mouth scramble that saw Jimmy Howard (27 saves) lose track of the puck. After Game 5, Versus’ Jeremy Roenick took Marleau to task for his poor play in that game. Marleau’s tally turned out to be a big one.

With the Sharks ahead by two goals and seemingly ready to roll on to victory, the Wings wouldn’t go quietly again. Once again it would be Pavel Datsyuk who would do his part to lead the Wings back scoring perhaps the goal of the playoffs ripping a backhand shot over the shoulder of Antti Niemi.

With the Wings within one, the pressure was on as the game closed down but Detroit didn’t have one more miracle in their pocket. Sharks captain Joe Thornton had perhaps one of the best games of his career earning a great assist on Setoguchi’s goal in the first and doing his part to shadow the Wings’ best players defensively and winning faceoffs. Pierre McGuire spoke with Thornton after the game to get his thoughts.

For Detroit the loss is disappointing for sure and with the Wings losing the services of both Todd Bertuzzi and Dan Cleary to concussions in this game, their battle to win the game and the series was made even more difficult down two key forwards. As useful as guys like Justin Abdelkader and Patrick Eaves are they’re not as offensively skilled as either Cleary or Bertuzzi. The Wings’ offseason will see some changes coming to it and also a potential retirement from Nicklas Lidstrom.

The Sharks are able to move on to the Western Conference finals where they’ll meet the top seeded team in the conference. With Vancouver laying ahead for the Sharks, they’ll have quite the road ahead to try and do battle with them. After such a knockdown, drag out series with Detroit, they’ll have to stay sharp to keep up with the equally motivated Canucks.

Here’s the highlights from tonight’s game:

Here’s the recap from the Versus crew: