Toews scores pair as Hawks spear Sharks 4-2

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Jeremy Roenick played on some big-time teams in his career, including the 1990-91 Blackhawks who racked up 106 points and won the President's Trophy and the 1991-92 Hawks that went to the Stanley Cup Finals.

But Roenick calls the San Jose Sharks team he now plays for the best he's ever been with.

"Top to bottom, it's the best," Roenick said.

It's hard to argue with Roenick considering the Sharks took a 36-6-5 record into Saturday night's game against the Hawks at HP Pavilion.

This was what the Hawks considered a statement game against the top team in the Western Conference and their intensity showed as they beat the Sharks 4-2 behind 2 goals from Jonathan Toews.

"It's a big win in lot of ways," Toews said. "We're starting to play again like we can."

The Hawks battled through some controversy to go 2-1 after three stops on their eight-game road trip.

In the midst of one of their best first periods of the season, the Hawks appeared to take a 2-0 lead at 10:59 when Dave Bolland scored. But the goal was nullified by a high-sticking penalty that occurred minutes early.

When Bolland scored it was the first stoppage in play since the high-stick, so when the linesman notified referee Don Koharski of the penalty the goal came off the board under Rule 33.4.

On top of the no-goal ruling, the officials embarrassingly got the penalty wrong, sending Kris Versteeg to the box instead of Patrick Kane, whose stick was the one cutting Jonathan Cheechoo.

"It was the right call by the rule book," Hawks coach Joel Quenneville said.

The rule reads: "Should a linesman witness a foul committed by an attacking player or goalkeeper (undetected by the referees), before the attacking team scoring a goal, the linesman shall report what he witnessed to the referees, the goal shall be disallowed and the appropriate penalty assessed."

With Versteeg in the box, the Sharks got a power-play goal by Marcel Goc at 12:06 to make it 1-1 and take away the considerable momentum the Hawks had built on an early goal by Toews and Bolland's apparent score.

But the Hawks weathered the controversy and retook the lead at 7:56 of the second period on Versteeg's short-handed goal on a pass from his back by Bolland.

"We were strong mentally and we didn't let that affect us and kept playing our game," Duncan Keith said.

Toews scored his second goal on a power play with 3:45 left in the second. Keith added a power-play goal in the third.

Nikolai Khabibulin was razor sharp again, making 32 saves.