Interim coach Bob Boughner talked about having an open competition at goaltender for the San Jose Sharks after taking over earlier this week.
Dell made 33 saves, including several tough stops while protecting a lead in the third period, and the San Jose Sharks snapped a season-high six-game losing streak by beating the Vancouver Canucks 4-2 on Saturday night.
“He was our best player,” Boughner said. “He made some key saves at key times and really kept us in it when we were starting to take on water. That’s what a goalie does in a win like that.”
Boughner said that performance will earn Dell another start on Tuesday, while usual starter Martin Jones works with goaltender coach Evgeni Nabokov.
WATCH | Sharks snap 6-game skid with win over Canucks:
It will be the first time all season that Dell will start consecutive games as the Sharks try to get on a roll after giving Boughner his first win since taking over from the fired Peter DeBoer earlier this week. San Jose lost its first game under Boughner 6-3 to the Rangers on Thursday night.
“I think our compete level was a little big higher,” Dell said. “I think we really wanted to dig ourselves out of this hole and this was the first step. I think we played a little safer of a game tonight than we have in the past, and I think that showed a lot.”
Tomas Hertl and Timo Meier scored to give San Jose the lead. Evander Kane and Logan Couture added empty-net goals around a score by Bo Horvat with 28.4 seconds to play for Vancouver.
The Sharks were protecting a 1-0 lead early in the third when Dell came up with several big saves following defensive breakdowns, robbing J.T. Miller, Tanner Pearson and Brock Boeser early in the period. He made another stop of Boeser to fuel a rush the other way.
Erik Karlsson sent a pass out to Meier, who worked a give-and-go with Kane before beating Markstrom with a one-timer for his 11th goal of the season.
“You want to feel good about your game,” Sharks defenceman Marc-Edouard Vlasic said after playing his 1,000th career game. Now “some guys are feeling better, we’re feeling better as a team. It’s just one game so we’ve got to string some together.”
Virtanen answered less than a minute later on a pass from Adam Gaudette but Dell held the Canucks off until after Kane’s goal restored the two-goal advantage.
“It’s never easy chasing the game the entire night,” Horvat said. We “have to find a way top come out better. It’s execution. Once we started passing and making plays for each other we played well.”