Quinn Hughes had a goal and an assist to hit the 30-point mark after just 19 games and Thatcher Demko made 27 saves to lead the host Vancouver Canucks to a 3-1 victory over San Jose Sharks on Monday night.
Hughes tied his career high for goals in a season with his eighth to go along with 22 assists. He became just the third defenseman in NHL history to compile 30 points in fewer than 20 games to begin a season and the first since Al MacInnis in 1990-91. Bobby Orr accomplished the feat five times.
Sam Lafferty scored a short-handed goal and J.T. Miller also scored for Vancouver, which extended its winning streak against the Sharks to 11 games.
Tomas Hertl scored and Mackenzie Blackwood finished with 34 saves for San Jose, which fell to 0-8-0 on the road this season.
San Jose, which fell behind 8-0 after two periods en route to a 10-1 loss to the Canucks on Nov. 2, appeared to break on top at the 11:06 mark of the second period when William Eklund knocked in a rebound. However, Vancouver successfully challenged for goalie interference by Fabian Zetterlund, who made contact with Demko while firing a shot and skating through the blue paint.
A little over two minutes later, the Canucks took a 1-0 lead when Hughes skated down the left wing and fired a sharp-angle wrist shot from the bottom of the circle off the far post and into the net.
Vancouver’s Nils Hoglander was ejected and given a match penalty for intent to injure when he slew-footed Kevin Labanc at 18:31 of the middle period. However, the Canucks made it 2-0 when Lafferty tapped in a rebound of a Teddy Blueger shot with 0.7 seconds left in the period for his fifth career short-handed goal.
San Jose took advantage of the remainder of a five-minute power play at the start of the third period when Hertl slapped in a rebound of a Calen Addison point shot to cut the gap to 2-1 at the 48-second mark.
Miller made it 3-1 at 7:10 when he flipped in a rebound of his own shot from the slot for his 12th goal of the season.
–Field Level Media
