With only two games left in the regular season for our San José Sharks and 34 games left overall throughout the entire league, there have been exactly 6,963 goals this season with at least 40 more to come over the next 5 nights.  Now, everyone knows that every single goal is noteworthy, but for some odd reason NHL.com has decided to ignore the upcoming goals and has already posted a poll for the top 5 goals of the season.  And wouldn’t you have already guessed it, not a single one of the Sharks’ 253 goals were nominated, regardless of how many great games our Sharks have won.

The goals that have been nominated are these:  To start off with, the nearly unknown Niklas Hagman’s (Toronto) goal against Florida in which he grabs the puck in the corner, dekes around Nathan Horton, dodges three poke checks, then puts it behind a diving Craig Anderson.  Then there is the amazing rookie Blake Wheeler’s (Boston) shorty against St. Louis where he takes a long pass, crosses into the offensive zone, lines up three Blues players, spins around, works his way into the crowd and shoves the puck behind a speechless Manny Legace.  Then to redeem the St. Louis Blues, they bring in another rookie, T.J. Oshie, in a dreadfully important game against Vancouver.  Oshie picked up a nicely placed pass off the boards, avoided a diving Canuck, skated into the slot, waited patiently for Roberto Luongo to commit and put it top shelf into a wide open net.  Next, of course, what is any NHL poll without their pride and joy Detroit Red Wings being nominated?  Johan Franzen’s early season goal against the Montréal Canadiens off of an O’Byrne turnover in the neutral zone.  O’Byrne obviously tried to fix his mistake like any good defenseman, but Franzen was too much as he danced around the stunned defenseman on three separate occasions, before he put the puck behind a surprised Carey Price.  And finally, last, but not least, the seemingly conceited (probably rightfully so) Alexander Ovechkin’s (Washington) famous goal also against Carey Price while puck handling and sliding on his bum. 

What about the Sharks though?  In this season alone, they have broken about 5 league records and at least a dozen franchise records.  Certainly, they must have at least one goal that made the media's jaws drop.  I mean, yes, they’re known for their garbage goals off of accidental goalie rebounds, but not all of them are like that.  So I went through almost every single goal this season by the Sharks (some of them wouldn't load) via NHL Game center and decided for myself which ones were the best—one at a time.

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So it's official—with 109 points in the standings—2008-2009 is the best regular season the Sharks have ever played.  Unfortunately, subsequent to clinching home-ice advantage in the playoffs, the rest of the season becomes almost a needless mundane task.  After the seemingly endless regular season of 82 games, we are almost to what it all comes down to: the Stanley Cup Playoffs.  I mean, yes, a lot of us are for the great battle with the Detroit Red Wings and Boston Bruins (sorta) for the President's Trophy, but personally if I were a Shark (oh, if only life was so kind) that would only be a second objective compared to lifting the holy grail of hockey—Lord Stanley's Cup.

So let's face the music, as many hockey fans have been thrilled to obsessively repeat through this season, the Sharks clearly do not have the best record in the playoffs.  However, in condolence Mike Babcock of the vile Red Wings offered one description of what it is like to play in the NHL Playoffs and one possible explanation for the Sharks' woes.  One of the biggest factors in playoff success is location, location, location.  Babcock said, the Wings "hope for distance."  By that he means the shortest distance traveled in the playoffs always is the best route.  So, in the case of the Sharks, playing Anaheim or Vancouver in the first round would be more beneficial than playing Nashville or Edmonton.  "Distance was the greatest thing (last season), because we got to play Nashville so barely traveled in the first round," Babcock said.  "The year before, we played Calgary, San José, and Anaheim, and with all those time zones and distances, that's a huge wear and tear on you."

Point taken, but that should be enough crap about the Red Wings, what about the Sharks?  Let's go analyze and size-up the Sharks' potential 1st round opponents!

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