Thornton scores in 1,000th game with Sharks in win against Penguins

SAN JOSE --The San Jose Sharks extended the longest current winning streak in the NHL to seven games with a 5-2 victory against the Pittsburgh Penguins at SAP Center on Tuesday.

Tomas Hertl had his second NHL hat trick, and Joe Thornton scored in his 1,000th game with the Sharks and 1,532nd in the NHL. Marcus Sorensen also scored, and Evander Kane had three assists for the Sharks (28-13-7), who are 14-2-2 in their past 18 games.
"We're a confident group" Kane said. "We feel if we show up to play and play our best game we have a good chance to win every night. We're confident in that. This is how you continue to climb in the standings. You put wins together consecutively. We need to continue to do that because it's real tight right now."
WATCH: [All Penguins vs. Sharks highlights]
Martin Jones made 22 saves for his eighth straight win, matching his career high set in his first eight NHL games, Dec. 3-21, 2013 with the Los Angeles Kings.
Kris Letang and Derick Brassard scored for the Penguins (25-15-6), who lost two straight games for the first time since Nov. 28-Dec. 1. Matt Murray made 24 saves but had his NHL career-high nine-game winning streak end.
"They were on their game tonight," Murray said. "We have to give them some credit, they really outplayed us all game, especially having players in front of the net. I think they just outplayed us, we didn't go hard enough at the net fronts. That's a pretty good team over there."
Letang gave Pittsburgh a 1-0 lead at 10:17 of the first period with his 11th goal of the season. He skated end to end and scored on a backhand from the left face-off circle to the upper-right corner.

San Jose tied it 1-1 at 12:00 when Sorensen redirected Erik Karlsson's point shot from close range.
Hertl made it 2-1 at 14:05 when he knocked Penguins forward Evgeni Malkin to the ice along the right boards, skated around defenseman Jack Johnson and elevated a snap shot from the low right circle to the far side.
"We showed again our best game, all 20 guys with Jonesy," Hertl said. "We're just playing our game now. That's why we're having the winning streak. I'm so happy for everyone on the ice because we're winning. That's most important. That's a lot of fun. It's not about who scores, it's about if we win the game or not."
Thornton extended the lead to 3-1 at 3:39 of the second period on a slap shot from the high slot, his 10th goal of the season.
"It's just the balanced scoring," Thornton said. "It seems like a lot of guys are going at the same time. I credit a lot of that to great defense, too. The defense is giving the pucks to forwards and they can go. The team is playing real well right now."

Hertl knocked in a rebound from close range at 2:06 of the third to make it 4-1.
"We didn't play well tonight, obviously," Penguins forward Phil Kessel said. "They outdid us in every zone. Obviously we didn't do the little things right. They got to our net a lot. They got some rebound goals. Offensively, we didn't create enough opportunities for our guys."
Brassard scored 18:10, cutting the lead to 4-2, but Hertl completed the hat trick with his 100th NHL goal into an empty net at 19:35 for the 5-2 final. The hat trick was his first since scoring four goals against the New York Rangers in a 9-2 win Oct. 8, 2013, as a rookie.
"It was wild," Hertl said. "It was over five years. I scored it in my third game. It was nice. It had been a while. It's always fun and guys were just looking for me. I had an easy job on the last one and just knocked it in."

They said it

"They brought their 'A' game tonight. They were really good. They're one of the better teams we've played this season. They outplayed us all over the rink. We weren't good enough and I know we are better than that. We didn't execute tonight. We lost a lot of puck battles. They won the battles in front of the nets." -- Penguins coach Mike Sullivan
"I thought that was as complete a game as we've played all year. I thought our defense was solid, Jonesy was solid, special teams. And we did get contributions from all four lines. I really thought, especially the second period, we really set the game up for ourselves with how well we played." -- Sharks coach Peter DeBoer

Need to know

Penguins forward Patric Hornqvist (concussion) missed his third straight game. … The Penguins had their six-game road winning streak end. … Letang has 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in his past 11 games. … Sharks defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic (wrist) missed his sixth straight game. … Kane had a game-high six shots. … Malkin and Jake Guentzel each had six-game point streaks end. … Karlsson, who missed the morning skate, sat out the final 6:05 for precautionary reasons with San Jose scheduled to play again on Wednesday, DeBoer said.

What's next

Penguins: At the Arizona Coyotes on Friday (9 p.m. ET; FS-A, ATTSN-PT, NHL.TV)
Sharks: At the Arizona Coyotes on Wednesday (10 p.m. ET; NBCSN)