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Tuesday, 12 April 2011 13:00

Written by Seth Rorabaugh

(2) Sharks vs. (7) Kings

Sharks Leading Regular Season Scorer: Patrick Marleau (right), 73 points (37 goals, 36 assists).

Kings Leading Postseason Scorer: Anze Kopitar, 73 points (25 goals, 48 assists).

Sharks Regular Season Statistics

Kings Regular Season Statistics

Sharks with Stanley Cup bling: Dan Boyle, Ben Eager, Kent Huskins, Antti Niemi, Niclas Wallin.

Kings with Stanley Cup bling: Dustin Penner, Rob Scuderi, Justin Williams.

Something worthwhile about the Kings: The Kings had the fourth-best penalty killing unit in the NHL this seasons with a success rate of 85.5 percent.

Something useless about the Sharks that is vaguely connected to the Penguins: The first home shutout of the Sharks was recorded by Tom Barrasso in an 8-0 Penguins win at the Cow Palace, Dec. 5, 1991.

Something useless about the Kings that is vaguely connected to the Penguins: The all-time leading postseason goal scorer in Kings history if former Penguins forward Luc Robitaille with 41.

Former Penguins on the Sharks: None.

Former Penguins on the Kings: Alexei Ponikarovsky, LW; Luc Robitaille, President business operations; Rob Scuderi, D.

Who needs to be the difference for the Sharks: Joe Pavelski. Joe Thornton, Patrick Marleau and Dany Heatley will always be the headliners in San Jose. But Pavelski the Shark's most clutch player when it comes to postseason play. And as he goes, the Sharks go. After producing 15 points in 11 games through the first two rounds of last year's postseason, Pavelski was limited to two assists in a four-game sweep by the Blackhawks in the Western Conference final.

Who needs to be the difference for the Kings: Jonathan Quick (above). He will have to steal games. And even then, that probably won't be enough. The Kings don't have an overly prolific offense to begin with. To make matters worse, their leading scorers - Kopitar and Justin Williams are injured. Kopitar is done for the season while Williams is a question mark heading into the postseason. They'll have to get defensive and forces the prolific Sharks to grind out some 2-1 games. That begins and end with Quick.

Best Sharks YouTube Video We Could Find: San Jose's "V Line" of Johan Garpenlov, Iror Larionov and Sergei Makarov hooking up for a nice goal against the Red Wings in a 1994 Eastern Conference quarterfinal series:

Best Kings YouTube Video We Could Find: Former Kings forward Bernie Nicholls scoring a goal with his back during the 1988-89 season:

EN Prediction: As we said earlier, the Kings are going to have trouble producing goals in this one. The injuries to Kopitar and Williams are killers. For the Sharks, they have a bonafide postseason performer in net with Antti Niemi after over a decade of disappointment with Evgeni Nabokov. This will be over quickly. Sharks 4-0.

(Photos: Marleau-Christian Petersen/Getty Images; Quick-Jeff Gross/Getty Images)

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