Sharks’ Logan Couture to miss at least a month with broken leg

Until further notice, Tomas Hertl will replace Couture on the second line, with Joel Ward and Patrick Marleau on the wings.

“Not much went wrong tonight”, DeBoer said.

Joonas Donskoi did not play Friday with a lower body injury that’s bothered him since he blocked a shot last Saturday against Anaheim.

During the first-ever three-on-three overtime for both clubs, each team had chances to end it. Kyle Palmieri fired wide on a breakaway, and later Burns deked his way towards the net only to be stopped by Schneider.

The line was together for one preseason game, September 29 against Vancouver, as Goldobin had an assist on an even strength goal by Brent Burns. Without Couture, Team Teal has little choice but to throw a Band-Aid on the situation and count on its forward depth to preserve its current standing atop the Pacific Division.

Nikolay Goldobin was called up from the Barracuda of the AHL to take Couture s spot on the roster.

Since the beginning of training camp, DeBoer has continuously said that he wants the Sharks to be a four line team with interchangeable pieces up and down the lineup. Goldobin also managed a respectable 21 points in 38 matches playing among men as an undersized 19-year-old in the Finnish Elite League a year ago.

Earlier in the third, the Sharks took three consecutive minor penalties as Justin Braun, Brenden Dillon and Marc-Edouard Vlasic headed to the box.

“It’s tough. He’s a big presence in the middle and eats up a lot of ice time in all situations”, Sharks captain Pavelski said of Couture. Someone will come in and do a good job as well.

The game marked coach Peter DeBoer’s first game back at Prudential Center since he was sacked in late December after three-and-a-half seasons.

The only other time in Couture’s National Hockey League career that he missed a significant amount of games because of injury was in 2014, when was sidelined 16 games in January and February with a hand injury that required surgery.

Couture, 26, is arguably the team’s best all-around forward when his defensive play and willingness to block shots are combined with his creative ways in the offensive zone.

It will be Smith’s first game of the season after he was a healthy scratch for games against Los Angeles, Anaheim and Washington.