In net, Hill has started four straight games as regular starter James Reimer has been a bit burned out. Bougner told reporters Wedneday that Lebanc just needed a “reset” and would return to the lineup against Minnesota. Labanc had been working bottom six minutes this season and had gone scoreless over his last six games before grabbing a seat in the pressbox against the Flames. Sharks head coach Bob Boughner made a splash in the shark tank on Tuesday, making Lebanc a healthy scratch - a rare move considering the forward had played in 258 straight games since November of 2017 before an injury knocked him out of the linup last April. Now, the Sharks are mostly healthy, missing only top-six winger Rudolfs Balcers who was placed on injured reserve this week due to a lower-body injury. The last time the Wild faced the Sharks, San Jose had recently been reeling due to COVID, having missed Kevin Lebanc, Marc-Edouard Vlasic and Radim Simek to quarantine. Logan Couture had a goal and two assists, while Brent Burns, Erik Karlsson and Alexander Barbanov each grabbed a pair of points while Adin Hill stopped 40 of 43 shots in the 5-3 victory.
Tomas Hertl earned the arena crew some free headwear when he scored his third of the game in the empty net.
Their current seven-game homestand started off auspiciously against the Flames, when the Sharks cam e back from a two-goal second period deficit, scoring three unanswered goals in the middle frame and pulled away with a late empty netter. On Tuesday night, San Jose began a stretch of the season where they will enjoy nine out of ten games at the SAP Center, with their only upcoming away game in December coming just down the I-5 in Anaheim. The Sharks took the first of three meetings between the two teams back on November 16th, thumping the Wild 4-1 in a game where a previouly struggling San Jose squad put their foot on the gas and didn’t let up, and the Wild’s slow start put them in a hole they couldn’t climb out of, even when they started picking up the pace in the third period.