SAN JOSE — The guys who wear the Sharks uniforms decided Sunday that what the playerss needed most was time together on their own.
One day before the NHL trade deadline and with his team reeling after going both winless at home and 3-8-2 overall in February, Sharks coach Todd McLellan agreed to a request let for a players-only session away from the rink rather than the scheduled practice.
“Through tumultuous times you’re looking for that,” McLellan said, adding players first approached him shortly after Saturday night’s 4-2 loss to the Ottawa Senators. “It goes back to the leadership. We’re looking for that. Who’s pulling the group together?”
Players did go through gym workouts before leaving for lunch at a restaurant. The only one who spoke to reporters was Patrick Marleau, who said they wanted to get together on their own “just trying to regroup . . . just talking about hockey.”
The times are indeed tumultuous for the Sharks, whose streak of 10 consecutive playoff appearances is very much in danger of being broken as the team hasn’t been able to pull out of its downhill skid.
With the NHL trade deadline coming at noon Monday, the Sharks are in the rare position — for them — of likely trying to unload players rather than acquire them for immediate help. Unrestricted free agents such as goalie Antti Niemi, defenseman Scott Hannan and forward Tyler Kennedy could be moved for prospects or draft picks.
And McLellan said he understands that as well as the difference between his own role and that of general manager Doug Wilson.
“Would I like him to trade for (players)? Of course I would. We’re human, we want to get better and we want the best,” McLellan said. “But, we also have to understand that we haven’t put ourselves in a position over the last month for us to walk into his office with a big evidence file, and say ‘do it.'”
Wilson, he added, “has to take care of the big picture. He doesn’t have to take care of the coach and he doesn’t have to take care of individual players. He has to have the ownership and the franchise and the fans’ best interests at heart. He can’t make decisions to save Todd McLellan or to save Marc-Edouard Vlasic, or whoever it might be.”
The Sharks actually have been going through those uneasy times times since their epic collapse in the playoffs last spring, losing in the first round to the Los Angeles Kings after winning the first three games of the series.
Wilson talked immediately afterward about the team needing to take “one step backward to take two steps forward,” and relying on young players in the system. Later, he and McLellan tried to stress that did not mean missing the playoffs.
Asked Sunday, McLellan said he did not think any of the comments from management let players off the hook for their performance this season.
“It shouldn’t,” the coach said. “The standard should be set in the room, not outside the room. I’ll leave it at that.”
But does it introduce doubt into a team that, though reeling from the playoff loss, was coming off a 111-point regular season?
“I think you’d have to ask them that question,” McLellan said, adding that he firmly believes it takes a long time to restore expectations of winning if a team gets the idea that it may not have to give everything possible to accomplish that.
“That’s not what we’re about,” he said. “I came out two weeks ago and said we’re a playoff team. That’s what our expectation should be. We’re capable of doing it.”
McLellan suggested that no change was imminent in the team’s current leadership structure that has four players — Joe Thornton, Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Marleau and Pavelski — serving as alternate captains.
The current predicament, the coach added, does provide a good test of leadership skills.
“We said there was going to be times where the weather wasn’t real good and it was going to rain,” McLellan said. “Then we would see how people would react. Well, we’re watching now.
“It’s easy to pick four captains when you’re won seven games in a row,” he continued. Hell, my wife could come in and be a captain at that point. But, what happens when it’s raining? Who goes where, and who’s hiding in the hole? Who’s sticking his head out?”
The Sharks get their next chance to start the turnaround Monday night against the Montreal Canadiens.
For more on the Sharks, see David Pollak’s Working the Corners blog at blogs.mercurynews.com/sharks. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/PollakOnSharks.
