San Jose rings in the New Year
with 1-0 victory over Columbus
By Giles Kennedy, Contributing Columnist
The San Jose Sharks added to the current woes for the Columbus
Blue Jackets, defeating them 1-0 at the annual New Year’s Eve game
at Nationwide Arena. San Jose center Alyn McCauley scored the only
goal and game winner with only 4:58 remaining in the third period
to extend the Blue Jackets home losing streak to 8 games. It was
Columbus’ 15th one goal loss this season. Things don’t get easier
as the Jackets hit the road for a seven game trip to Florida,
Colorado and California earning only one road victory this season.
Blue Jackets head coach Doug MacLean said the usual rhetoric
afterwards. “It’s a hard fought game,” he commented, “Both
goaltenders were outstanding, and it was a quick paced game. We
played well.”
In the first period, the first New Year’s Eve fireworks erupted as
the much reported and anticipated Jody Shelley-Scott Parker dual
took place. They both got in some good shots as they fought like
backyard bullies.
On the next face-off, David Ling, thinking that the Shelley-Parker
fisticuffs did not spark enough energy, dropped gloves with Scott
Thornton. Ling, the smaller player, was able to drag Thornton to
the ground and pull off part of his jersey. This brought the full
house of 18,136 to its feet.
“It’s always good to fight guys like that. Part of the game, part
of the way it goes,” Shelley chortled, “New Year’s Eve we could
have a few more fights.”
However, the offensive woes continued for the Jackets. They put 26
shots on net, but were not able to capitalize as San Jose
goaltender Evgeni Nabokov recorded his fourth shutout of the
season and 21st of his career.
"We played smart," Nabokov said. "We took what they gave us. In a
game like this, one goal is everything. Every shot's important and
they were in front of the net all the time."
“We had tons of chances by people that are supposed to be our
scorers and they didn’t put it in,” MacLean said. “We had umpteen
chances and didn’t capitalize, didn’t score.”
Rick Nash recorded only one shot on goal, a first period
breakaway, but was stoned by Nabokov. Defenseman Darryl Sydor led
Columbus wish 4 shots on goal.
San Jose head coach Ron Wilson knew that one shot or turnover for
either side would determine the outcome. "About
halfway through the game, we just decided it might be one of those
0-0 or 1-0 games and we'd better be on our toes," he said.
Finally in the third period San Jose broke the scoreless drought.
San Jose defenseman Rob Davison slid the puck to McCauley who was
standing unmarked between the circles with Marc Denis and the
Columbus goal clearly in sight. McCauley had enough time to take
the pass, steady the puck and whisk a wrister right through the
five-hole under Denis’ left pad to chalk up the game winner and
only goal of the contest.
“All my other shots, I got up high and got a lot of steam on them,
but on that one, a guy got my stick a little bit and caused me to
fan on it a little bit. But I got the end result and that's all
that matters,” McCauley said. “I wasn't concentrating on trying to
pick out any part of the net. Lo and behold, that one went in,
when on the other ones I broke out my geometry set and tried to
pick out the perfect angle I needed to score on, and it didn't
work."
MacLean summed up the season in a nutshell. “We’ve got too many
people that aren’t chipping in offensively. It’s been like that
since day one,” he said. “Our top guys aren’t putting the puck in
the net. Nash is scoring and Vyborny, and after that it’s dry.
We’ve talked about it umpteen times. That’s 15 one-goal losses
this year. That’s just ridiculous. It’s frustrating.”
Columbus goalie Marc Denis stopped 28 of 29 shots for his 8th loss
in a row. He is glad to be done with the 2003 part of the season
and on to 2004. “Let’s hope that this is the end of something
getting really old and the start of something new,” he said.
