The Ducks return home after a somewhat cathartic 7-4 win over Vancouver Saturday night, led by multi-point performances from Trevor Zegras (0-3=3), Adam Henrique (2-0=2), Nicolas Deslauriers (2-0=2) and Troy Terry (1-1=2). The victory snapped Anaheim's four-game winless streak and saw the Ducks return to the style of play that catapulted early season success.
"We didn't start the road trip the way we wanted," Deslauriers said. "We had to take a step back and think of what brings us success...That was our best game of the road trip for sure."
The focus now turns to maintaining that pace and structure heading into what could become a season-defining homestand. The Ducks will host four divisional opponents on the six-game run, including two meetings with the Sharks as well as matchups with the Kings and Golden Knights.
"We don't like to look backwards very often, but almost everybody in the dressing room was either in the organization or in our dressing room last year," head coach Dallas Eakins said. "This time last year wasn't fun. We were out of it and we were dying to be able to play for something."
The win in Vancouver helped Anaheim keep pace with the suddenly hot Pacific Division, still narrowly behind third-place Edmonton and fourth-place Los Angeles. Thirty games remain on Anaheim's regular-season schedule.
Anaheim meets San Jose for the first of a four-game season series, with tonight's game representing the contest originally scheduled for Dec. 27 (postponed due to COVID-19 protocols). The Sharks will return to Honda Center on March 6 and the Ducks will head north to SAP Center on March 26 and April 26.
The Sharks visit Southern California for a lone road contest bookended by two three-game homestands and are looking for crucial standings points to avoid falling out of the playoff race. San Jose earned just one of six possible points last week in divisional games against Edmonton (3-0), Vancouver (5-4 OT) and Vegas (4-1).
The Sharks sit seventh in the Pacific Divison by both points (22-22-5, 49 points) and point percentage (.500).
The club added veteran winger Ryan Dzingel on waivers Monday, claiming the Illinois native one day after he had been traded from Arizona to Toronto. Dzingel has four goals and three assists in 26 games this season.
