The Sharks dominated the St. Louis Blues in Game 1 of their Western Conference final series on Saturday, winning 6-3 at SAP Center.
While the Blues were interested in getting physical with the Sharks, San Jose was more concerned with winning the hockey game, and they did so, in large part, by bottling up Blues star Vladimir Tarasenko.
The star forward has been quiet for the majority of the Stanley Cup playoffs, and if he doesn't find a way to get going against the Sharks, St. Louis could be done in short order.
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Blues interim head coach Craig Berube knows he needs his star to be the goal-scoring machine he's capable of being.
"Vladi has to work without the puck a lot harder," Berube said after Game 1. "And he will. And he's got to get more involved. You can't just wait for things to happen. Especially in the playoffs. You've got to go get it. You've got to make it yourself. It's about working. it's about working with your line."
Tarasenko has been MIA for most of the Blues' playoff run. He had just one shot on goal in Game 1, the first time he's managed only one rip on the net in 21 games. He also was a minus-three, bringing his plus-minus for the playoffs to minus-eight. That's the worst mark of any player this postseason.
As they did in the 2016 Western Conference final, the Sharks aren't leaving the task of shadowing Tarasenko to Marc-Edouard Vlasic alone. Instead, the Sharks are aggressively clamping down on him with double teams when the puck comes. Sending two defenders at one player would create a defensive issue for a number of teams, but the Sharks are good at swarming the opponent's best player without getting burned. They had a lot of success in their second-round NHL playoff series win against Nathan MacKinnon and the Avalanche.
San Jose Sharks
Since the start of the 2014-15 regular season, Tarasenko has scored 182 goals, which trails only Alex Ovechkin and John Tavares. In 58 career playoff games, he has 27 goals and 38 points.
So, why does Tarasenko have a tendency to go into these lulls? One Western Conference assistant coach has a thought.
“I think you go to any number of different factors,” the anonymous coach told The Athletic. “We eliminate skill as an issue, that’s not a problem. Conditioning at different times in his career has maybe been an issue, but that’s likely not it. I would feel very comfortable ruling that out at this point of the year. So then you start to get into some mental or emotional factors and maybe that’s it. Maybe it’s just his ability to raise his competitiveness — all the things that are not skilled-based, that are not physical — to make an impact at this time of year. Can Vladi somehow muster enough to compete, using this current series as the comparison, with (Joe) Pavelski, (Logan) Couture and (Brent) Burns, which is really what the Blues need?”
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Tarasenko has scored just once in the last seven playoff games and hasn't lit the lamp in the last four. That's got to worry the Blues as Monday night's Game 2 approaches.
The Sharks know they have to continue to make him a non-factor in the Western Conference final. If they do that, they'll likely punch their ticket to the Stanley Cup Final.