Andrei Kuzmenko nets pair to lead Canucks past Sharks

Andrei Kuzmenko scored two goals and Quinn Hughes had a goal and an assist as the host Vancouver Canucks extended their point streak to nine games with a 7-4 victory over the San Jose Sharks on Saturday night.

Nils Aman, Sam Lafferty, Dakota Joshua and Pius Suter also scored for Vancouver, which goes into the three-day holiday break with an NHL-best 49 points. The Canucks also moved two points ahead of defending Stanley Cup champion Vegas at the top of the Pacific Division with the win.

Elias Pettersson, Conor Garland, Teddy Blueger and J.T. Miller each added two assists for the Canucks, who improved to 7-0-2 over their last nine games. Thatcher Demko made 21 saves to improve to 11-0-0 in 11 career starts against San Jose.

Mikael Granlund had a goal and an assist, Mario Ferraro had three assists and Tomas Hertl, Fabian Zetterlund and Jacob MacDonald also scored for San Jose, which suffered its fifth straight loss. Filip Zadina added two assists while Mackenzie Blackwood finished with 19 saves.

Kuzmenko, a healthy scratch the previous two games, scored twice in the first seven minutes to give Vancouver a quick 2-0 lead. The first goal came on a wrist shot from the high slot into the top right corner of the net while the second came on a redirect of a Miller pass into the slot on the power play.

San Jose rallied to tie it, 2-2, later in the first period when Anthony Duclair's shot deflected in off Granlund and Hertl put in a backhanded rebound of a Zadina shot.

Aman put Vancouver back in front, 3-2, at the 6:03 mark of the second period when he tapped in a Blueger crossing pass at the end of an odd-man rush. Lafferty made it 4-2 a little over two minutes later when he deflected in an Ian Cole shot from the left point.

Zetterlund cut it to 4-3 at the 11:08 mark with his ninth goal of the season off a Ferraro pass. Joshua put the Canucks back ahead by two goals, 5-3, with 47 seconds left in the period with a wrist shot off a Garland pass at the end of an odd-man rush.

San Jose closed to 5-4 at the 13:16 mark of the third period when MacDonald chipped in a rebound of a Zadina shot. But the Canucks regained their two-goal lead with 4:17 to go when Suter deflected in a Hughes shot from the left point.

The Sharks pulled Blackwood for an extra attacker with 2:13 left and Hughes sealed the win with an empty-netter.

—Field Level Media