Sharks current record: 16-40-7 (.310)
Sharks projected record: 22-53-7 (.311)
NHL record for worst season in 82-game history: 14-57-11 (.238)

The Sharks Sterility Stare is posting late on Saturday this weekend, as the San Jose Sharks broke a 9-game losing streak tonight with a 2-1 victory over the Ottawa Senators. This came on the tail end of a week where the team blew 2 very winnable games against the Dallas Stars, wrapped around losses to the Minnesota Wild and the New York Islanders. We were starting to wonder if the Sharks would ever win again this year.

Overall, the team has had an L11 to start the season, an L12 in the middle of the year, and now this L9 in the winter months of the schedule. That’s 32 losses encapsulated in 3 different dreadful stretches of hockey. Take out those terrible losing streaks, and the team has a 16-8-7 record—which is not their true talent level, of course, but it’s an interesting thing to note all the losing streaks could have been avoided with better play.

Take last Saturday night’s shootout loss to Dallas: the Sharks had multiple chances to win the shootout and failed before losing in the 7th round. Then against the Stars just 3 nights later, San Jose blew a 3-goal lead at home in the third period to lose in overtime. We’ve explored way too many inexplicable losses like those this season, and if the team could have won those specific games, they’d still be a “bad” team. Yet, the losses burn.

Those defeats contribute to that “L32” factor, and they damage the psyche of the team. What’s interesting about tonight’s win over Ottawa is that the team traded away one of its few “stars” yesterday, sending center Tomáš Hertl to Vegas—just a few days after sending left wing Anthony Duclair to Tampa Bay. Those guys are No. 2 and No. 5, respectively, on the team in scoring, and the Sharks suck at scoring goals, as we know.

Before the victory tonight, San Jose was ranked 31st (out of 32 teams) in scoring with 137 goals; of course, the team is dead last in goals allowed (249)—and the Sharks had coughed up 7 goals in each of their prior 2 losses, the OT loss to Dallas and the loss to the Islanders. But San Jose goaltender Magnus Chrona surrendered just the 1 goal to the Senators, and he’s now played pretty well in his last 2 starts. That is a sign.

Maybe this team can be much better next year? Maybe by trading away overpriced veterans, the team will be able to rebuild its roster with the anchor of a young, talented goalie for next year. Chrona almost won that shootout loss against Dallas all on his own, and even with Hertl and Duclair, the Sharks couldn’t score in the shootout. Give it another year with some roster changes, and who knows what San Jose can do.

We look forward to finding out. But Hertl (34 points in 48 games) and Duclair (27 in 56) weren’t “stars” in any sense of the word: the team will be fine without them. And the Sharks will be better next year without them if younger players like Chrona can step up.