The Phoenix Coyotes hosted the San Jose Sharks on Saturday night. The Coyotes had been going through a rough stretch of games as of late, but managed to pick up a 5-3 win over the first-place Sharks.
After a scoreless first period, Logan Couture opened the scoring at 3:44 in the second to put the Sharks on top. Just 32 seconds later, Raffi Torres scored his eighth goal of the year to tie it up, with assists from Michal Rozsival and Daymond Langkow. Lauri Korpikoski scored his 12th goal of the season, with assists from Shane Doan and Boyd Gordon, to put the Coyotes on top, 2-1 at 9:29. Adrian Aucoin got two minutes for roughing and Jamie McGinn was able to tie it up for the Sharks on the power play at 12:26. With less than a minute left in the period, Martin Hanzal got his sixth goal of the year to put the Coyotes on top for good. Ray Whitney and Radim Vrbata had the assists.
Korpikoski added his second goal of the game and 13th of the year at 8:03 in the third period, once again with assists from Gordon and Doan. That was pretty much the extent of offense from either team until the final minute. Patrick Marleau picked up his 20th goal of the season at 19:27 to bring the Sharks to within 4-3, but Vrbata answered back with one second left on the clock as he netted his 24th goal of the season. Whitney and Hanzal had the assists as the game ended by a final score of 5-3 in favor of the home team.
Phoenix is now 3-4-3 over their last ten games. They have a 23-21-8 overall record and now have 54 points, putting them only two points behind the third-place Dallas Stars in the Pacific Division.
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