The Sharks earned their first win against a playoff-bound team in more than two weeks Saturday night, but their 4-2 victory over the Vancouver Canucks might have come at a high price.

Joe Thornton left the game with 4:37 left in the second period after Vancouver defenseman Alexander Edler pushed the Sharks center, who fell awkwardly into the boards at high speed.

Thornton’s status for today’s game against the Colorado Avalanche was unknown immediately after the game.

“I haven’t got an update that I can share with you at this point,” Sharks coach Todd McLellan said, indicating Thornton still was being evaluated. “We’ll be able to give you a lot more tomorrow when we know.”

Thornton seemed to be favoring his right leg as he was helped off the ice, but he appeared to go shoulder-first into the boards.

Goals by Dany Heatley, Patrick Marleau and Joe Pavelski paced the Sharks to their third victory in a row, with Ryane Clowe adding an empty-netter with 10.8 seconds left to play. Evgeni Nabokov made 35 saves to become the second goalie in NHL history to earn 40 victories in three consecutive seasons.

The victory also gave the Sharks 102 points at the top of the Western Conference, three more than the Chicago Blackhawks, who have two games in hand, and two more than the Phoenix Coyotes.

But the injury to Thornton, one of the Sharks’ marquee players and one of the NHL’s top playmakers, overshadowed everything.

No penalty was called on the play in which he was injured, though Clowe immediately went after Edler and a scrum developed.

“From talking around, I don’t think it was a dirty hit, but it was just a reaction,” Clowe said of his decision to get in Edler’s face after seeing Thornton prone on the ice. “And I don’t think I did anything too serious, just give him a little shake.

“One of the best players in the league, you don’t want to take any chances,” added Clowe, who also avoided a penalty on the play.

If Thornton is unable to play tonight, it would be the first time in 380 games that he wasn’t in the lineup since being acquired by the Sharks on Nov. 30, 2005.

“He’s a very durable player, but he’s human,” McLellan said.

Unlike their previous two games, the Sharks didn’t get the first goal in this one.

Vancouver took a 1-0 lead midway through the first period when Nabokov failed to hug the near post, and Alex Burrows’ 28-foot wrist shot at a harsh angle trickled into the net.

But unlike games during their recent losing streak, the Sharks didn’t fall any further behind and came back with three unanswered goals in the second period.

The first came on a power play when Marleau slid the puck to Heatley after crossing the blue line, and Heatley unleashed a 31-foot wrist shot that beat Vancouver goalie Roberto Luongo at 3:01.

Marleau did all the work on the Sharks’ second goal, stealing the puck from Edler, then outracing him into the Vancouver zone before beating Luongo with a backhand from just outside the crease at 9:29. Two minutes later, San Jose had a two-goal lead when Pavelski batted a rebound of his own shot into the net off the far post.

Daniel Sedin brought Vancouver within one goal at 7:55 of the third period when he scored on a power play. But the Canucks got no closer as Nabokov came up big and benefited when former Sharks defenseman Christian Ehrhoff clanged one off the post.

McLellan praised his goaltender and the entire team for not letting that early goal get them off track.

“It was nice to see him and the team respond after that,” McLellan said. “I think that’s a real good, positive sign for everybody that Nabby dug in and the rest of the guys dug in for him, and we crawled out of that one-goal deficit together, not as individuals.”

For more on the Sharks, see David Pollak’s Working the Corners blog at blogs.mercurynews.com/sharks. Contact him at 408-920-5940.