The Sharks needed all eight rounds, and Askarov was there for every one

The Sharks and Islanders spent eight rounds of a shootout waiting for somebody to get a puck past a goaltender. Ivar Stenberg finally managed it, beating Ilya Sorokin with a wrist shot at SAP Center. San Jose took a 3-2 win from the New York Islanders on Monday.

It was the first win for the Sharks in six games, and they took about as long as they could to get it.

Yaroslav Askarov made that ending possible. He stopped 30 of New York’s 32 shots through overtime, then denied all eight Islanders attempts in the shootout. Sorokin answered with 37 saves on 39 shots before the tiebreaker, which is why the score alone undersells how much work both goaltenders did.

San Jose did not skate away from the Islanders. It kept the game within reach until somebody finally found a clean finish.

The Sharks had to erase two deficits in regulation, and the equalizers came from different sources. Ben Hutton gave New York the lead 6:14 into the first period. Stenberg answered at 16:41, redirecting Tyler Toffoli’s shot with Ty Dellandrea also credited on the play.

The goal mattered because it stopped the Islanders from carrying their early advantage into the intermission and gave San Jose a response from a young forward who would later decide the game.

Victor Eklund restored New York’s lead 1:11 into the second on a power play. San Jose’s next answer arrived at 12:12, when Toffoli tied the game after Dmitry Orlov’s shot. The goal came six seconds after the Sharks’ power play expired and was recorded at even strength.

That detail gives the sequence a little texture: San Jose did not convert the advantage itself, but it kept possession of the moment long enough to score just after the advantage disappeared.

Then both offenses ran into the goalies. The third period produced no change, and neither did overtime. Sorokin handled the heavier workload without allowing the Sharks to turn 39 shots into a goal in the third period or overtime.

Askarov was just as important in the other crease, preserving the tie through the final period and extra time. A team can create enough chances to win and still need its goaltender to keep the whole evening from becoming a loss.

Sorokin had an answer for seven San Jose attempts before Stenberg beat him. Stenberg moved in from the left side and shot over the glove. It was the only successful attempt from either team. A loss in that fashion is a rough return for a goalie who had already seen enough pucks to win most nights.

At the other end, Yaroslav Askarov saved 30 shots in the game itself. Then he got eight more chances to lose a shootout, and gave up nothing. San Jose’s forwards could keep trying things because he had kept the score exactly where they needed it.

Stenberg had already scored in the first period, when he redirected Toffoli’s shot to pull San Jose even. That one counted on his season total. The shot in the eighth round belonged to a different category, the one that tells you how a tie gets settled. Both came when the Sharks needed a change in the score.

The Sharks’ sixth comeback win is worth noting, though it needs the surrounding numbers. This was only their second victory in their last nine games, and the result moved them to 8-11-1. The skid is over; the larger repair job is not. San Jose still required a shootout against an Islanders team that finished the night 7-6-4, and Sorokin faced more shots than Askarov.

That makes the win sturdy rather than transformational. The Sharks found two equalizers, received outstanding work from Askarov, and got the final release from Stenberg after seven attempts had failed on each side. For one night, that was enough to turn a frustrating stretch into two points.

Eight rounds gave the result its drama, but the reason San Jose earned the chance to win was simpler: its goalie kept answering until its young forward finally did too.

Sources

NHL: official game summary and completion time

NHL Sharks–Islanders game report

Islanders game report