Sharks Win 9th Straight on Road

[March 19, 2008]  LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Brian Boucher stopped 29 shots and San Jose beat the Los Angeles Kings 2-1 on Tuesday night for the Sharks' ninth straight win on the road.

The Pacific Division-leading Sharks, whose franchise-record 11-game winning streak ended with Sunday's 2-1 shootout loss at home against Edmonton, improved to a league-best 26-8-3 on the road. They are one victory shy of the club record for consecutive road wins, which they set in December.

They are the first team in NHL history with two road winning streaks of nine or more games in the same season.

Boucher, who beat St. Louis 2-0 in his Sharks debut on March 1, was 4:47 away from his 15th career shutout when Lubomir Visnovsky used Milan Michalek as a screen and beat the goalie high to the glove side with a slap shot from the top of the left circle. The 10-year veteran goalie, who had five consecutive shutouts with the Philadelphia Flyers in 2003-04, spent most of this season with the AHL's Philadelphia Phantoms before signing with San Jose as a free agent on Feb. 26.

The Kings, coming off a 2-0 loss at Minnesota on Saturday, have scored two goals or less in eight of their last nine games.

Los Angeles is at the bottom of the NHL standings with 62 points, four behind Tampa Bay with eight games left -- although the Lightning have two games in hand. The only time the Kings finished a season with the league's worst record was in 1969-70. They ended up last in their division six times, most recently in 1998-99.

Joe Thornton opened the scoring at 17:09 of the first period while Matt Ellis was off for hooking Patrick Marleau, and reached the 20-goal mark for the eighth straight season. Marleau's assist on the goal was his first in nine games, but he has six goals during that stretch -- including the game-winner in consecutive victories against Ottawa and Chicago.

Patrick Rissmiller made it 2-0 at 16:23 of the second period, converting his own rebound to end a 16-game goal drought.

Notes: Evgeni Nabokov has started in net for all but three games for the Sharks this season. ... The visiting team has won each of the first six meetings this season. The series is tied at 3-all, with a home-and-home set coming up on April 1-3. ... San Jose was 0-for-2 on the power play. The Kings haven't been short-handed more than four times in 13 consecutive games, and 21 of their last 23. Opposing teams were 1-for-30 on the power play over the previous nine contests. ... Sharks C Jeremy Roenick, who was a healthy scratch, needs one goal to tie Hall of Famer Jean Beliveau for 36th place on the career list at 507.

[Associated Press]

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