Rookie Shark Bites Blues

February 11, 1999 / 11:28 PM EST / AP

After beating up on the St. Louis Blues, the San Jose Sharks rubbed it in.

"They didn't have much motivation over there," said Owen Nolan, who had two assists in a 5-1 victory Thursday night. "They looked flat the whole game.

"When we see stuff like that we try to take advantage of that and discourage them even more. We had them from the word go."

The Blues couldn't argue any of Nolan's points.

"Some nights it's like you can just see it's not there," coach Joel Quenneville said. "Tonight was one of those nights where you could have done anything and nothing was going to change."

Rookie Alexander Korolyuk followed a career-best three-assist game with two goals. His five-point, two-game explosion came after he totaled eight points in the first 24 games.

"The young legs were really important," coach Darryl Sutter said. "It wasn't just Korolyuk. Both teams played last night and both teams were playing three games in four nights."

Steve Shields stopped 29 shots as the Sharks won their third in a row by a combined 13-3 after dropping the first two games of a 10-game trip the longest uninterrupted trip in NHL history. San Jose has won on consecutive nights, beating Chicago 5-2 on Wednesday night.

The Calgary Flames had an 11-game trip in 1987, but it was halted by the All-Star break after the first three games.

Shields, who has made two starts this month, was about the only Sharks player who didn't enjoy the rout. That's because he's allowed two or fewer goals in 12 of his 16 starts and has only five victories to show for it.

"It's nerve-wracking," Shields said. "It's tough to relax when you're not playing a lot. You've got to go out there once a week and do your best."

Patrick Marleau got past Blues defenseman Chris Pronger on a 2-on-1 break and fed to Korolyuk at 8:28 for the game's first goal. Korolyuk got his second goal on another 2-on-1 after Mike Ricci shed a would-be check by Pascal Rheaume at the blue line and fed him the puck at 20 seconds of the second to make it 3-0.

Al MacInnis scored during a two-man advantage in the second period for the Blues, who have lost their last four at home. This was the first game of a seven-game homestand for St. Louis, which later gave up a shorthanded goal to Jeff Friesen on the same power play. It was the first shorthanded goal for Friesen, who tied for the NHL lead last season with six.

The Blues lead the NHL in fewest shots allowed (21.9), but that hasn't kept their goaltenders from struggling. It took the Sharks only 14 shots to get their first four goals against rookie Rich Parent, who shut them out 3-0 in his first career start Jan. 26.

The Blues are 11-9-3 at home this season after going 26-10-5, fourth-best in the league, last season. St. Louis is 5-1 in its last six road games, previously a problem area, and came from behind in the third perod to win its last two. But each time the gap was one goal, and against the Sharks the deficit was 4-1.

Mike Rathje also scored for San Jose, and Dave Lowry tacked on a power- play goal with 1:28 remaining.

Pronger was struck by a puck and bruised his left ankle early in the first period and sat out most of the game. Pronger, who leads the NHL with an average of 30.9 minutes per game, had only five shifts and played 4:45.

"I couldn't turn the one way, so it was no sense letting them walk around me all day," Pronger said.