Oilers v. Sharks - Revelation 16:1

Then I heard a loud voice from heaven call out to eight angels saying, "Go and pour out on Edmonton the eight bowls of the wrath of God, one for every season of their misery."

San Jose Sharks @ Edmonton Oilers

Rexall Place, 7:30 p.m. MST
Television: TSN

The Race to the Bottom (It's Happening Again):

Visiting Team Scouting Report: The San Jose Sharks have been a good team for a long time now. They just clinched a spot in the playoffs again. That makes ten consecutive seasons of playoff hockey, and fifteen of the last sixteen. In fact, the Sharks have missed the playoffs just five times in their entire twenty-two year history, which is just incredible. If we compare that to the rest of the modern expansion franchises, San Jose stands out in a big way:

These numbers include this year's performance, so Columbus may well end up being two for thirteen, but the Sharks really do stand well above the crowd with only the Senators even coming close.

Expected Lineups:

Edmonton Oilers (25-38-9):

Hall - Gagner - Perron
Lander - Nugent-Hopkins - Eberle
Hendricks - Gordon - Pitlick
Gazdic - Smyth - Jones

Marincin - Petry
Ference - Schultz
Klefbom - Fraser

Scrivens

San Jose Sharks (46-18-9):

Pavelski - Thornton - Burns
Marleau - Couture - Nieto
Wingels - Sheppard - Havlat
Kennedy - Desjardins - Burish

Vlasic - Demers
Irwin - Boyle
Stuart - Braun

Niemi

By The Numbers:

• Boyd Gordon has the second most difficult end-zone start ratio in the entire league with 81.4% of his end-zone faceoffs taking place in the defensive zone. Since he takes very few neutral zone draws, Gordon has also seen a higher percentage of his total faceoffs in the defensive zone (59.5%) than anyone else in the league.
  
• When San Jose traded Dany Heatley to the Minnesota Wild for Martin Havlat, I thought it was a great deal for the Sharks. Things have gone pretty much as I expected with Heatley going through the significant decline stage of his career (he has 0.53 points per game in 190 games since the trade). Havlat, on the other hand, hasn't been nearly as good as I was expecting with 0.50 points per game in just 129 games since the trade. Safe to say that both teams are probably ready to move on, which might mean a compliance buyout for Havlat this summer.
  
• Ryan Jones has seen a huge drop in ice time this year. He averaged 15:26 per game in 2011-12, 13:59 per game last season, and just 10:00 per game so far this year. With just 13 points in his last 77 games over the last two years, he must know that the writing is on the wall for next year. I wonder how his experience of the last ten games this season will differ from those who know they'll be make next year.