Staal tied it when he beat Martin Jones on a wraparound. It was Staal's 30th goal of the season and extended his point streak to four games (four goals, three assists).
"I think the biggest thing is we're showing that we're sticking to the game plan," Cullen said. "Early in the year, we may have changed things up a little bit if things weren't going our way and find ourselves in trouble, and dig a hole. But I think it's been pretty good here lately. We've found a way to stick with what we're doing and keep going at it. Eventually things are going to come. It's good you build confidence in that. That's important this time of year."
Joakim Ryan and Chris Tierney scored for San Jose (33-21-9), which lost its third game in a row (0-2-1). The Sharks have a two-point lead on the Calgary Flames for second place in the Pacific Division.
"I think we obviously would like more points, but we're playing good teams in the Central Division," Sharks coach Peter DeBoer said. "We're banged up a little bit and we're gonna take as many points as we can. We're still in a good spot here. We control our own destiny, so you can dwell on the negatives all you want. I'm not gonna; we battled our [butts] off here tonight."
Ryan gave San Jose a 1-0 lead at 14:00 of the first period with a one-timer from the right face-off circle. Tierney extended the lead to 2-0 at 2:28 after a turnover by Mike Reilly in the neutral zone.
Jones made 38 saves.
"It's disappointing not to get the win, for sure," Jones said. "It's obviously a tough trip. Four tough teams, tough buildings. But we've got to start picking up more points here if we want to make the playoffs."
