The San Jose Sharks take on the Seattle Kraken tonight without their No. 1 center, Tomas Hertl.
The San Jose Sharks (13-32-4) take on the Seattle Kraken (21-18-10) tonight without their No. 1 center, Tomas Hertl.
Head coach David Quinn told reporters today that Hertl will miss tonight's game. He was unclear about his availability for tomorrow's matchup against the Anaheim Ducks.
William Eklund will play center tonight in Hertl's absence.
Jacob MacDonald has been activated off IR and will return to the lineup.
The last time these two teams met, the Kraken embarrassed the Sharks.
Quinn said he reminded his team of this game.
"They took it to us big time up there. That was one of the poorer games of the year," Quinn said. "They can come at you fast. They've got balance. They may not have superstars, but they have a lot of good players. They test your work ethic and your speed. We're going to have to be on our game tonight."
Quinn wants to use the last game against the Kraken as motivation.
"Don't let that happen again, but more importantly, let's follow up a poor performance with a good performance. Let's not let one poor performance like we had against Buffalo turn into two. We just happen to be playing a team that took it to us pretty good up in Seattle," Quinn explained.
The Kraken are coming to San Jose in the middle of a massive playoff race. They sit two points behind the St. Louis Blues for the final wild-card spot. The Kraken defeated the Columbus Blue Jackets 4-2 in its last game.
Mackenzie Blackwood will start in goal for the Sharks, and Kyle Burroughs stayed on the ice late this morning so he could be a healthy scratch.
Sharks projected line combinations:
Hoffman-Couture-Zetterlund
Barabanov-Eklund-Duclair
MacDonald-Sturm-Kunin
Bailey-Carpenter-Zadina
Mukhamadullin-Rutta
Okhotiuk-Addison
Vlasic-Emberson
Blackwood
Kahkonen
Puck drop is at 7:30 and can be seen on NBC Sports California or the Sharks Audio Network.
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