SAN JOSE — Life without Marc-Edouard Vlasic: 1-0.

After producing a 14-17-3 record without Vlasic over the last three years, the Sharks managed to pick up a shootout win against the Anaheim Ducks at the SAP Center Saturday with their top-shutdown defenseman sidelined by a head injury.

Dylan DeMelo drew into the lineup for the first time since Oct. 7 and Brenden Dillon jumped up to the second pairing. Although the blue line committed its fair share gaffes, they helped the offense tilt the ice by moving the puck, helping the Sharks produce a 45-26 shot advantage in the game.

“They did a good job. It’s not easy taking (Vlasic) out. You see his importance,” head coach Pete DeBoer said. “We bent but didn’t break.”

Here’s what we learned as the Sharks picked up a 2-1 win in their first overtime game of the season.

1. Kevin Labanc is likely headed to the AHL Barracuda. .

Puckheads attending the AHL Barracuda’s clash with the Texas Stars at the SAP Center Sunday evening will likely get a chance to watch Labanc flash his skills against minor league talent.

Labanc received a demotion from the Sharks top line to the fourth line during the second period Saturday and the elevator appeared to be dropping even further once he got out of the shower.

The 21-year-old forward had a meeting with general manager Doug Wilson within view of a throng of reporters in the Sharks locker room after the game, suggesting a reassignment is imminent. Labanc has recorded just one point in his last six games after bursting out of the gates with three goals and six points in his first seven contests.

Labanc’s apparent demotion could just be a one-game wakeup call as the Sharks aren’t slated to return to action until the Tampa Bay Lightning roll into town on Wednesday. On the other hand, the Sharks could also recall another skilled forward to take his place among the team’s top-nine forwards until he earns his back to the NHL.

Danny O’Regan, who won the AHL’s rookie of the year award last season, has recorded five goals and eight points in nine games with the Barracuda, and Marcus Sorensen, who suited up for 25 games with the Sharks last season, including six playoff games, has notched six points in nine games.

2. Did the Sharks showcase Barclay Goodrow for a potential trade?

DeBoer surprised fans, reporters and Joel Ward Saturday when he penciled Goodrow in as his fourth line center.

Goodrow hadn’t played center since minor hockey when he was 13 or 14 years old, so even he was surprised when he learned that he’d be skating in between Timo Meier and Ward.

The experiment paid off as Goodrow set up Ward’s game-tying goal at 11:57 of the third while producing a possession rating of 57.14 percent in an unfamiliar role.

“He admitted he hadn’t played there in a long time,” DeBoer said. “He’s a smart player, and the way we play, we’re interchangeable down low. I thought that he could do it and help us and he did.”

But it’s possible that there’s more to the move than it being a simple lineup tweak.

Goodrow should be an everyday player in the NHL and it’s hard to see how he fits into the mix with the Sharks this season.

The 24-year-old power forward cracked the lineup for just the second time Saturday as DeBoer is turning to Ward to be the heavy presence on the Sharks bottom line. At the same time, the organization has skill and speed bubbling up through the pipeline with O’Regan and Sorensen in the minors.

The best situation for Goodrow, who mastered the AHL by collecting 84 points in 118 games with the Barracuda the last two seasons, and the Sharks might be to include him in a trade package for a scoring forward down the road.

But DeBoer debunked this notion in his postgame press conference, insisting that Goodrow got inserted into the lineup because Ryan Carpenter hasn’t been getting the job done.

Carpenter is without a point in 10 games and his possession rating is in the red at 49.71 percent.

“When you win, that doesn’t necessarily mean that everybody played at the level you’re looking for them to be at,” DeBoer said, calling out Carpenter without naming names.

Nevertheless, it seems somewhat odd that DeBoer would be so desperate to swap out Carpenter for a player who hasn’t skated at center in more than a decade after three-consecutive wins.

Perhaps something is brewing in the general manager’s office or maybe it was just a prescient move by a smart coach.

Stay tuned.

3. Joonas Donskoi is still a shootout magician.

Joonas Donskoi reached into his bag of shootout tricks, securing the Sharks win in the sixth round of the shootout by faking out Anaheim Ducks goalie Ryan Miller with a series of flashy-deke moves.

Why describe Donskoi’s Picasso strokes when I can just paste the clip here?

Donskoi earned notoriety for being a shootout wizard in the Finnish Liiga, a reputation that’s followed him to Sharks practice over the last three years.

“He does that to me all the time, so I’m not surprised,” goalie Martin Jones said.

What is surprising is DeBoer’s decision to wait until the sixth round of the shootout to play his trump card.

“I think he’s missed his last four or five in a row, so that’s probably a decent reason that he’s a little further down in the lineup,” the Sharks coach said.

The bench is all of us after Donskoi's shootout goal. #SJSharks pic.twitter.com/YdY8l5LT5I — San Jose Sharks (@SanJoseSharks) November 5, 2017

In truth, Donskoi’s number hasn’t been called in a shootout situation since his rookie campaign in 2015-16 when he scored two goals but was stopped on his last two attempts.

My guess is we’ll see No. 27 on the ice the next time the Sharks are tied after overtime.