VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) Andrei Kuzmenko scored his 35th goal, a Canucks franchise record for a first-year player, to lead Vancouver to a 7-2 rout of the San Jose Sharks on Thursday night.
The Russian forward, who also had an assist, topped the 34 goals scored by Pavel Bure in 1991-92.
J.T. Miller, Dakota Joshua, Conor Garland and Phillip Di Giuseppe also each had a goal and an assist, and Vasily Podkolzin and Sheldon Dries scored for Vancouver. Tyler Myers had a pair of assists and Thatcher Demko made 17 saves.
Tomas Hertl and Andrew Agozzino scored for the struggling Sharks, who are winless in their last eight games (0-5-3). San Jose has not won in regulation since beating Seattle 4-0 on Feb. 20.
Vancouver opened the scoring 6:15 into the first after Miller picked off Hertl’s pass at the Sharks’ blue line and snapped a shot past Reimer for his 29th goal.
Kuzmenko made it 2-0 when he deftly moved the puck from his forehand to his backhand, then shoveled a shot in. Elias Pettersson earned an assist on the play, extending his point streak to a career-high 10 games.
Hertl cut the Sharks’ deficit to 2-1, but Joshua restored the Canucks’ two-goal lead with a shot past an outstretched Reimer with 0.4 seconds left in the opening period.
Vancouver made it 4-1 in the second on Garland’s goal, and then the Canucks sealed it with another three-goal period in the third.
The Canucks won their ninth straight game against the Sharks, including all four matchups between the teams this season.
NOTES: D Filip Hronek played his first game in a Canucks jersey. Vancouver acquired the 25-year-old from Detroit on March 1 for first- and second-round picks in this year’s draft, but an upper-body injury kept Hronek out of the lineup until Thursday. Vancouver’s Christian Wolanin left with a lower-body injury midway through the first period and did not return.