Optimistic Sharks Look to ‘Take Care of Home Ice’

SAN JOSE — There is only one way to look at this game, at the rest of this series, if you’re a member of the San Jose Sharks: We’ve got this.

That is not to say that the Sharks are proud of the way they’ve been playing, certainly not to say that they should be satisfied with the way they’ve been playing. They know they need to be better. They’ve said they need to be better. They purport to believe they will be better in Game 3 on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, TVA Sports).

“Both teams are playing well,” defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic said after Game 2. “Both teams are very good. And it could have gone either way in both games.”

That is technically true. Each of the first two games was decided by one goal, with the Pittsburgh Penguins getting a late goal from Nick Bonino (with 2:33 seconds left) to win Game 1 and an overtime goal from Conor Sheary (2:35) to win Game 2.

“I think we competed with them,” Sharks coach Peter DeBoer said. “Again, both games are one-goal games. Both ended late in one and overtime in the other. I think from a compete point, we’re right there.”

Well, maybe. But that sentiment and the one by Vlasic might be a rather optimistic view of what happened in Games 1 and 2 in the Stanley Cup Final, games in which the Penguins mostly dominated the Sharks.

But that is what the Sharks need at this moment. That is the only way they can think and act and believe, while the coaching staff does its best to tinker and tweak behind the scenes.

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