SAN JOSE — The first time Joonas Donskoi stepped inside the SAP Center locker room that is used by visiting NHL teams was in the summer of 2015. He was there during the Sharks’ development camp, just a few weeks after he signed an entry-level contract with the club out of Finland.
Sunday morning, Donskoi, was back inside the same locker room, this time as member of the Colorado Avalanche, who were getting ready to play the Sharks that night.
“It’s weird. It’s the first time in my career to kind of like play against my old team,” Donskoi said Sunday. “It was kind of fun yesterday just hanging out with my teammates and seeing the city again, and tonight to play against the Sharks, it’s going to be fun.”
It’s no secret that Donskoi, 27, was seeking a fresh start with another team after the end of last season, when he had 37 points in 80 games.
Donskoi, the author of one the Sharks’ notable goals with his overtime winner in Game 3 of the 2016 Stanley Cup Final, didn’t score in his last 34 regular season games, and had one goal and two assists in 12 playoff games,
Donskoi then signed a four-year, $15.6 million with the Avalanche, a deal the salary cap-strapped Sharks weren’t likely to match.
“I feel like I wasn’t going in the direction I wanted to with San Jose. That’s all on me,” Donskoi said told this newspaper in January when the Sharks played in Denver. “There’s nobody to blame for it. We had a great team for four years in San Jose and we were close to winning the Stanley Cup and had lots of good memories.
“But some reason, I got stuck with my game and wasn’t helping the team as much as I wanted to. So, I felt like that was a good time for me to reset, have a change of scenery and kind of get a fresh start.”
Donskoi got off to a blistering start for the Avalanche this season, collecting 28 points through his first 40 games as he spent time in a top six forward role, including Nathan MacKinnon’s line.
Donskoi missed five games in January to recover from a concussion, which included the Jan. 16 date with the Sharks at Pepsi Center.
In 18 games from the start of February until Friday, Donskoi had one goal and two assists. He has, though, set a new career-high with 15 goals and is averaging just over 16 minutes of ice time per game, more than any of the four seasons he spent in San Jose.
“As a new guy coming in, with some of our key injuries early in the year, he got elevated in playing first line with MacKinnon and picking up a bunch of different roles for us,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said Sunday. “He did a great job. He’s a versatile guy and we move him around a bunch.”
Donskoi’s first game back at SAP Center won’t come with the same fanfare as Joe Pavelski’s return did Jan. 11 or Patrick Marleau’s first game back as a visitor in 2017 when he was with the Toronto Maple Leafs.
But with the absence of Donskoi and Pavelski, the Sharks have been searching for players to command a right wing spot in the top six for most of the season.
For Sunday’s game, the Sharks had rookie Noah Gregor on the top line with left wing Evander Kane and center Logan Couture. Kevin Labanc was the right wing on Joe Thornton’s line with left wing Timo Meier.
The Sharks had a 3-1-1 record on their homestand, which ended with Sunday’s game.
“There’s been a lot of changes, and unfortunately they changed the coaching staff and all that,” Donskoi said Sunday. “So, there’s been some bumps in the road maybe for them. But I think lately for them, they’ve been winning some games and playing some good hockey.”
▪ Besides Gregor, who was a scratch for Saturday’s 2-1 overtime loss to the Ottawa Senators, Sharks interim coach Bob Boughner also inserted winger Lean Bergmann, who had been a scratch the last three games. Bergmann replaced Antti Suomela and was a winger on the fourth line with Dylan Gambrell and Marcus Sorensen.
