Reilly Smith and Jake Guentzel both collected two goals and two assists and Bryan Rust scored once in a four-point outing to pace the visiting Pittsburgh Penguins to a 10-2 beating of the San Jose Sharks on Saturday.
Smith and Guentzel matched career highs for points in a game.
Evgeni Malkin scored twice, Vinnie Hinostroza notched one goal and one assist, and Kris Letang and Matt Nieto added singles for the Penguins, who snapped a two-game skid and went into the clash with just one win in six outings.
Erik Karlsson recorded two assists in his first game back in San Jose after being traded to the Penguins in the summer, and Sidney Crosby collected one helper in his 1,200th regular-season game.
Goaltender Tristan Jarry made 24 saves.
Anthony Duclair and Jacob MacDonald replied for the last-place Sharks, who came off a 10-1 beating against the Vancouver Canucks on Thursday. San Jose is winless on the season (0-10-1) and has scored only 12 goals.
The Sharks are the first team to allow 10 goals in consecutive games since the Boston Bruins in 1965-66.
Starting goalie Mackenzie Blackwood surrendered six goals on 18 shots before receiving a mercy pull just before the midway point. Magnus Chrona, in his NHL debut, stopped 13 shots.
Smith’s power-play goal on the game’s first shot opened the scoring 90 seconds into the clash, and he doubled the lead at the 12:55 mark of the first period for his sixth goal of the season.
Guentzel kicked off Pittsburgh’s five-goal second period when he made it 3-0 at the 3:21 mark with his third goal of the season and 200th of his career, and Hinostroza scored in his first game of the season 65 seconds later.
Duclair’s power-play goal put the Sharks on the board at 8:34 of the period, but Malkin responded 38 seconds later and Letang’s tap-in tally, his first of the season, set up by Crosby 15 seconds after that, made it 6-1.
Chrona’s welcome was Nieto’s goal just over two minutes later, and Rust tallied 49 seconds into the third period to extend the lead to 8-1.
MacDonald scored San Jose’s second power-play goal of the game at 9:20 of the third period, but Malkin replied with a power-play goal of his 102 seconds later, his seventh of the season, and Guentzel added another at 12:10 to put the Penguins at double digits.
–Field Level Media
