SAN JOSE, Calif. _ Marcus Sorensen might have been the most surprised person inside SAP Center on Saturday night when Ottawa Senators forward Ryan Dzingel grabbed him near the front of the San Jose net and started to throw punches in his direction.
Perhaps Sorensen could sense the frustration. After all, the Sharks were taking full advantage of a fragile Senators team.
The Sharks jumped all over the Senators from the start and never let up in a 5-0 win at SAP Center. Logan Couture had a goal and an assist and Joe Pavelski, Brent Burns and Kevin Labanc each had two points and Aaron Dell made 25 saves for his second shutout of the season. The Sharks had 50 shots on net.
Marc-Edouard Vlasic and Melker Karlsson also scored for the Sharks, who held the Senators to just 14 shots through the first two periods.
After Dzingel's fight with Sorensen, Alex Burrows was given a game misconduct for his hit on Sharks defenseman Dylan DeMelo as Ottawa, which now has just one win in its last 11 games, picked up 26 penalty minutes in the third period.
Coming into Saturday, the Sharks' game against the Senators could have been perceived as their easiest on their three-game homestand.
Ottawa had gone 1-6-1 away from home since Nov. 19 and came into Saturday with a pedestrian 5-6-2 road record for the season. Since a blockbuster three-team trade with Nashville and Colorado on Nov. 5 that saw Matt Duchene come from the Avalanche to Canada's capital city, the Senators have gone 3-8-2 and came into Saturday 15th in the Eastern Conference.
But the Senators still had two-time Norris Trophy winning defenseman Erik Karlsson and forwards Mark Stone and Mike Hoffman, who had combined for 23 goals and 46 points in Ottawa's first 27 games.
Karlsson came into Saturday with one goal and 17 assists, as he and Burns were behind the blistering point paces they set last season. Burns had 29 goals and 76 points to help win his first Norris, and Karlsson had 17 goals and 71 points. He was second in Norris voting.
Burns, after recording seven assists in the Sharks' first 18 games, has been showing signs of breaking out, though, with two goals and five assists over the last eight games. The Sharks enjoyed a 5-2-1 record in those games.
"We dove into the analytics on (Burns) and the shots and where he's getting them from in comparison to other years, and we really feel it's just a little bit of puck luck on his end," Sharks coach Pete DeBoer said Saturday morning. "Obviously some teams game plan for you, but Karlsson's been getting that for years.
"Those guys, they find a way. Even though they're not sticking the puck in the net, they're usually the best player on the ice whenever they're suiting up. I don't want to speak for (Senators coach) Guy (Boucher), but I don't think either of us are that concerned about it."
With Danny O'Regan in the minors and Joonas Donskoi and Mikkel Boedker both hurt, the Sharks re-formed much of their original No. 1 power play unit they had at the start of the season. Burns, Joe Thornton, Pavelski, Couture and Tomas Hertl formed the top unit, and Timo Meier, Chris Tierney, Labanc, Vlasic and Tim Heed on the second unit.
The top unit was reunited Thursday when the Sharks broke through with two power play goals in their 5-4 overtime win over Carolina.
"I don't know. It worked obviously we had some real special teams success last game, so we're just going to stick with it. I don't know if it's long term work or not, but it worked last game and we'll hope it works tonight."
Dell came into Saturday with a 4-3-1 record and a 1.93 goals against average that was tops among all NHL goalies with at least 10 games played.
_The Sharks announced Saturday that defenseman Paul Martin will begin a conditioning assignment with the Barracuda. Martin, 36, had been out of action for close to two months and was rusty he returned against Carolina. The Sharks decided that it would be better for them and Martin to get the rust off at the AHL level rather than the big club.
Martin will practice with the Barracuda on Sunday before he and the team depart for Tucson, where San Jose will play two games against the Roadrunners, the AHL affiliate of the Arizona Coyotes. The Barracuda then returns home to play Bakersfield, Edmonton's affiliate, on Saturday and Sunday.
There is no definitive timeline for how long Martin will need to be at the AHL level, although the maximum time allowed for a conditioning stint is two weeks.
For Saturday's game, Brenden Dillon played alongside Burns and Heed played with Dylan DeMelo on the Sharks' third defense pair.
_Forward Barclay Goodrow has a lower body injury and will miss about a week, DeBoer said. Goodrow missed seven games from Nov. 18-Dec. 1 with another upper body injury, and had scored two goals in three games since his return.
For Saturday's game, Ryan Carpenter took over fourth line center duties from Goodrow with Jannik Hansen and Marcus Sorensen on the wings.
_Forwards Donskoi (midsection) and Boedker (lower body) both remained on IR and are day-to-day at this point, DeBoer said.
