SAN JOSE -- Considering all of the chaos surrounding the Sharks over the last 24 hours, you might have forgotten that they still had a game to play Thursday night.
It wasn’t the tightest game San Jose has played this season, nor was it the most dominant. And while the Sharks were able to take a late lead thanks to Brenden Dillon’s first goal of the season, the visiting New York Rangers buried a few late-game goals to hand San Jose a 6-3 loss and extend the losing streak to six games.
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Here are three takeaways from Bob Boughner's debut behind the bench:
Defense still needs work
Clearly, the Sharks are still a work in progress. A coaching change isn't going to make them a different team overnight. So while aspects of their game looked better on Thursday, there are still areas they need to tighten up, with defense being the area that stuck out the most against New York.
San Jose did a good job early on of being stingy in its own zone and leading the charge with eight blocked shots to the Rangers' two. But in the second period, the Sharks began giving the visitors more room to move the puck up the middle of the ice which, in turn, made Martin Jones' job harder. It's no wonder the Rangers were able to score two goals less than three minutes apart in that frame.
San Jose Sharks
Goaltending remains a question mark
During Thursday afternoon’s press conference, Sharks general manager Doug Wilson was adamant that the defense in front of San Jose’s net needs to be better, but so do the goaltenders. Jones made some nice saves against an opportunistic Rangers team that never slowed down throughout the game, but he wasn't at his best on San Jose’s third-period penalty kill when he gave up multiple goals that he should have had.
If the Sharks are going to rebound from the current losing streak, Jones must regain the confidence he played with at the end of November. There’s no way around it.
[RELATED: Boughner confident in staff, wants Sharks to play inspired]
Hertl is on the mend
If there was one Sharks player who noticeably was better against the Rangers, it was Tomas Hertl. The Czech forward slowly has been recovering from an ankle injury that has encumbered his playing abilities. Against the Rangers, however, he looked like he's regaining some of his swagger.
Hertl's strength and patience paid off on the penalty kill when he beat netminder Alexandar Georgiev for a short-handed goal to open up scoring. But he also had a couple of chances later in the game that, despite not finding the back of the net, challenged Georgiev and New York's defense. Hertl might not be operating at 100 percent just yet, but at least he's showing flashes of the power forward he can be.