Sharks celebrate Joe Thornton’s winning goal in the third period against the Penguins.

San Jose used a three goal third period to defeat the Pittsburgh Penguins Thursday 5-3.  Trailing 2-0 entering the second period at the Tank, Raffi Torres energized the crowd and his Shark teammates by doing what he does best: making opponents nervous with his reckless style of hitting.

It turned out to be infectious as all the Sharks turned it up and pounded the Penguins immercifully, creating turnovers and odd man rushes that led to a shortie by Patrick Marleau, Brett Burns scoring twice and Big Joe Thornton scoring the winning goal on a Muhammad Ali floater from the blue line that beat Pens goalie Jeff Zatkoff.

The Penguins started their backup goalie because they face the Anaheim Ducks tonight and wanted to start Marc Andre Fleury against the Presidents Trophy leaders.  It seemed like a good move for awhile as the Sharks could not break through against Zatkoff, despite getting 17 shots on 4 power plays, many of them great chances.

But at 17:43 of the second they finally broke through on a point shot from D man Justin Braun that trickled through with heavy traffic in front provided by Adam Burish.  In the third, Marleau scored on a beautiful pass by Jason Demers faking Evgeni Malkin out of his girdle, while Sid brought up the rear.

Immediately after that, offensive juggernaut Ollie Maata scored his second of the game to retake the lead, only to have Burns score to tie it again.  Captain Joe Thornton then floated in the winner on a shot Zatkoff would surely like to have back.

I gotta say that the East Coast biased media made a lotta hay outta Sid the Kid being a -5 for the game.  I would like to respectfully say that number one: no credit was really given to San Jose, number two: there was was a lot of smack talk about Crosby’s effort on the play and three: Crosby has never scored against the Sharks, ever!  Can you believe that?  Me either.

Musing forward,  I think Patrick Marleau’s biological clock is ticking.  No,he isn’t pregnant but the way he has played this season and especially since winning gold in Sochi has me thinking he wants to win a Cup badly and soon.  San Jose fans know that he has never been known for his outgoing personality and his stint wearing the C was a not well received, lasting only a year.   Something seems to have lit a fire under his reserved demeanor and damn, its good to see!

Patty Marleau parties after his third period goal.