Liam Ohgren scores his 1st career goal to lead the Wild past the Sharks 6-2
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — Liam Ohgren scored his first career goal and the Minnesota Wild beat San Jose 6-2 on Saturday night to assure the Sharks of having the best odds to win the NHL draft lottery.
Ohgren, a first-round pick from the 2022 draft, made his NHL debut on Friday night in Las Vegas and delivered in a big way in his second career game.
He had an assist in the first period and then scored late in the second when Jonas Brodin’s point shot ricocheted right to Ohgren, who knocked it past Mackenzie Blackwood to make it 3-1.
“It was a great moment for me,” Ohgren said. “It was good timing because my brother and my dad leave today so I’m happy I did all that.”
Kirill Kaprizov added two goals in the final minute of the second period for the Wild, who were eliminated from playoff contention Tuesday night.
Matt Boldy, Declan Chisholm and Marcus Johansson also scored for Minnesota.
Jesper Wallstedt made 27 saves to get his second career win.
“It’s good for his confidence that he’s able to get two wins and play solid,” Wild coach John Hynes said. “He made some big saves. I really like his competitiveness. Now we have something to build off of.”
Jan Rutta and Mario Ferraro scored for the Sharks and Mikael Granlund had two assists to extend his points streak to 11 straight games. San Jose will have at least a share of the worst record in the NHL for the first time since their first two seasons as an expansion team in 1991-92 and 1992-93.
Blackwood made 32 saves.
The Sharks ended their home schedule with just 11 wins in 41 games and were outscored by 69 goals at the Shark Tank, the fourth worst mark for any team ever at home for a season.
“At the end of the day, every single one of us that’s going to be here next year has to take a long, hard look in the mirror and try not to be in the exact same position when we stand here next year,” Sharks forward Nico Sturm said.
The main thing at stake for the final home game of the season in San Jose was positioning for the draft lottery and the Sharks clinched the best spot for that.
The loss assures that Sharks will have the best chance at the No. 1 pick in the draft in June with 25.5% odds to win the lottery. San Jose can do no worse than the No. 3 pick but will hope for the top spot and the chance to draft Hobey Baker Award winner Macklin Celebrini, who played one season for the Sharks junior team while living in the Bay Area.
“It’s hard as a coach to think about that,” San Jose coach David Quinn said. “But obviously there’s a special player available and hopefully you get a chance to draft him.”
UP NEXT
Wild: At Los Angeles on Monday night.
Sharks: At Edmonton on Monday night.
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