Sharks at Lightning preview

SHARKS (14-8-2) at LIGHTNING (17-6-2)
7 p.m. ET, SUN, NBCSCA, NHL.TV

San Jose is 4-0-2 in its past six games and has outscored opponents 18-11 during that stretch. The Sharks are playing the second of back-to-back games after defeating the Florida Panthers 2-1 on Friday. Joe Pavelski scored his 300th NHL goal, and Chris Tierney had the game-winner in the third period.
The Lightning are back home after going 1-3-0 during a four-game, six-day trip. Tampa Bay is expected to be without injured defensemen Braydon Coburn and Jake Dotchin, and forward Cedric Paquette will be serving a one-game suspension for boarding Boston Bruins defenseman Torey Krug on Wednesday.
Lightning forwards Steven Stamkos (37 points) and Nikita Kucherov (36) remain 1-2 in the NHL scoring race, but they've combined for just one goal and four assists in Tampa Bay's past six games.

Players to watch

San Jose forward Joe Thornton has two goals and four assists during a five-game point streak.
Lightning defenseman Mikhail Sergachev has a three-game point streak (one goal, two assists) and is tied for eighth in the NHL in scoring among rookies with 17 points (six goals, 11 assists).

They said it

"Every injury is testing your depth. We don't have a lot of margin of error. There are a lot of 2-1 games but we're getting comfortable in those games so that's a good thing." -- Sharks coach Peter DeBoer
"We've got to get back to being a motivated hockey team. We've got to play with fire and an edge." -- Lightning forward Steven Stamkos

Sharks projected lineup

Timo Meier -- Joe Thornton -- Joe Pavelski
Kevin Labanc -- Logan Couture -- Tomas Hertl
Jannik Hansen -- Chris Tierney -- Mikkel Boedker
Melker Karlsson -- Ryan Carpenter -- Joel Ward
Marc-Edouard Vlasic -- Justin Braun
Brenden Dillon -- Brent Burns
Joakim Ryan -- Dylan DeMelo
Martin Jones
Aaron Dell
Scratched:Danny O'Regan
Injured: Joonas Donskoi (lower body), Tim Heed (upper body) Barclay Goodrow (upper body)

Lightning projected lineup

Vladislav Namestnikov -- Steven Stamkos -- Nikita Kucherov
Ondrej Palat -- Brayden Point -- Tyler Johnson
Alex Killorn - Yanni Gourde -- Cory Conacher
Chris Kunitz - JT Brown -- Ryan Callahan
Victor Hedman -- Andrej Sustr
Mikhail Sergachev -- Anton Stralman
Slater Koekkoek -- Dan Girardi
Andrei Vasilevskiy
Peter Budaj
Scratched:Jamie McBain
Injured:Jake Dotchin (undisclosed), Braydon Coburn (lower body)
Suspended: Cedric Paquette

Status report

Jones will start after Dell allowed a total of two goals in winning San Jose's past two games. … The Lightning recalled Conacher and McBain from Syracuse of the American Hockey League. Callahan did not practice Friday but participated in the morning skate.

Stat pack

The Sharks have won their last four visits to Tampa and are 6-1-1 at Amalie Arena since the start of the 2006-07 season.