Instead of a full practice at HP Pavilion on Wednesday, the Sharks met for 90 minutes in the locker room. The extended session included the entire hockey department from Executive Vice President and General Manager Doug Wilson to the coaches, players and staff.

In addition, rumor has it that sacrifices were made, the spirit of Mike Babcock was channeled and an image of Joe Thornton getting “owned” in a previous playoff game against the Wings was hung next to the urinals. The end result was, well, ...

“It wasn’t an alarming meeting by any means,” McLellan said. “It was positive.”

Right. Todd told everyone that he had been to the Cup Finals before and he knew that if the Sharks would just quit choking like diners at a two-bit seafood buffet they could make it there too.

Captain Patrick Marleau said, “There was no yelling or anything like that.”

There was, however, a good deal of crying, wailing and the gnashing of teeth. Then everyone left the room singing Kumbaya and went directly home to make reservations at local golf courses for late April.

Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 03/18/09 at 10:36 PM ET

Meeting like this never work and are a sign of problems on the team. The Sharks did this team meeting thing last year too, it took about 2 or 3 weeks for it to do anything. Good teams that have heart NEVER have team meetings like this.

All Sharks fans should be alarmed by this.

Posted by Didn't this happen Last year too on 03/19/09 at 12:48 AM ET

The problem isn’t just wholly from the players, but also from an ownership group that over rates its teams own players. One only has to look back at the trading deadline, when 2 days prior to the deadline Sharks GM Doug Wilson publically announced that the team would not trade underpreforming Jonathan Cheechoo, basically because the team sells to much Cheechoo merchandise and whistles.

The problem with the Sharks has been the same for the last 5 years or so, the team’s ownership is only about signing nice guy type players, players that provide good PR in the paper, players that will put butts in the seats, but not nessecarly players who will and can win a cup. Nice guys hardly ever win, yet that the Sharks MO sign decent players who are nice guys.

Team meetings are a sign of deeper problems within an organization.

Posted by The Problem on 03/19/09 at 12:52 AM ET

Just because there is a meeting doesn’t necessarily mean that the team is falling apart.  Sometimes a team gets back to what they were doing right after a meeting - if the meeting doesn’t work, then it doesn’t mean the team has problems that can’t be fixed.  It might just mean they are lousy at organizing and running meetings. 

(It does seem odd that the entire hockey department was there, though.  Usually it seems like the players-only meetings are the most likely to actually be productive.  The Sharks must have an enormous locker room!)

... basically because the team sells to much Cheechoo merchandise and whistles.

Oh god.  Please no San Jose - Nashville series in the playoffs.  My ears couldn’t take that.

Posted by Baroque from Michigan on 03/19/09 at 05:47 AM ET