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SAN JOSE, California (Ticker) -- A defensive breakdown in the first 10 minutes of the third period may have cost the
San Jose Sharks
a win, but defenseman
Scott Hannan
may have prevented a loss in the final moments of overtime.
After
Colorado Avalanche
defensemen
Rob Blake
and John-Michael Liles scored 4:16 apart in the third period, Hannan made a great play to stop
Joe Sakic
from getting a breakaway as the Sharks settled for a 2-2 tie.
Returning from a successful 2-1-0 road trip, the Sharks grabbed a 2-0 lead on a pair of goals by
Nils Ekman
. But San Jose could not solve
David Aebischer
again after Ekman scored on an odd-man rush midway through the first period.
But the Avalanche, who have 27 goals in the third period this season, finally got to
Vesa Toskala
. With the Sharks unable to clear the zone, Blake came down the right side and snapped a shot over Toskala at 2:53. After San Jose again couldn't clear the puck, Liles tapped in a rebound of Sakic's shot to tie it.
"I"m happy about a two-goal game, but their second goal, I missed their defenseman," Ekman said. "He stepped in and we had some small mistakes and it cost us one point. We should have won today."
Hannan's play and another solid effort by Toskala made up for the shaky start to the third and helped San Jose gain a point for the 15th time in 17 games.
Hannan made the best play of the night in the waning seconds of the extra period. A step behind Sakic, he dived and poked away the puck.
"I saw him chasing it down," Hannan said. "I had a good chance of getting to the puck, so I saw the puck and got to chip it away from him."
Toskala, who is filling in for injured starter
Evgeni Nabokov
, improved to 4-1-1 in his last six starts. He kept the game tied with a stop on
Alex Tanguay
's point-blank blast with three minutes left in the third period.
"When you're up two, you don't play to keep it 2-0," Sharks center
Mike Ricci
said. "You play a good style and you try to get another goal, but I think we sat back and they turned it up on us and started criss-crossing and creating havoc."
"I don't think we played great the first 40 (minutes)," Colorado coach Tony Granato said. "But we still hung around to where we were in a position to be able to salvage a point out of it."
Despite an indifferent 40 minutes, the Avalanche ran their unbeaten streak to four and have just two regulation losses in the last 15 games.
"The second period wasn't very good, but we battled back," Sakic said. "We've done that all year when we've been down in the third period, so that's a good sign."
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