This was the first playoff meeting between teams from Pittsburgh and the Bay Area since the Penguins swept the Oakland Seals in the 1970 Stanley Cup Quarterfinals.

After losing to the Rangers in the playoffs for the second consecutive year, the Penguins made waves during the 2015 offseason, trading for forwards Phil Kessel and Nick Bonino, re-signing defenceman Olli Maatta and forward Bryan Rust, and signing centres Matt Cullen and Eric Fehr in free agency.

General manager Jim Rutherford fired head coach Mike Johnston on December 12, 2015, after the team limped to a 15–10–3 start.

After goalie Marc-Andre Fleury suffered a concussion on April 2, the team turned to rookie Matt Murray for the final week of the regular season and the majority of the playoffs.

Centre and team captain Sidney Crosby led the club in scoring during the regular season and finished third in the league with 85 points.

During the offseason the Sharks hired former New Jersey Devils head coach Peter DeBoer to replace Todd McLellan and traded for former Kings backup goalie Martin Jones.

San Jose also picked up defenceman Paul Martin and right wingers Joel Ward and Dainius Zubrus via free agency.

Before the trade deadline, the Sharks acquired forward Nick Spaling, defenceman Roman Polak, and goalie James Reimer.

Number in parentheses represents the player's total goals or assists to that point of the entire four rounds of the playoffs Game one remained scoreless until Bryan Rust and Conor Sheary scored a minute apart for the Penguins midway through the first period.

Despite 18 third-period Pittsburgh shots directed towards Martin Jones, the score remained tied at two until very late in the game, when Kris Letang found Nick Bonino wide open in front of the net to give the Penguins the lead.

Early in overtime, a quick shot by Conor Sheary beat Martin Jones to give the Penguins a 2–1 win and 2–0 series lead.

In the third period, Nick Bonino high-sticked Joe Thornton, and in the dying seconds of the four-minute power play, Joel Ward fired a slap shot past Matt Murray to tie the game.

[9] At 7:36 of the first period, Phil Kessel took advantage of a poor Sharks line change and fired a shot that rebounded off Martin Jones and directly to Ian Cole, who scored his first playoff goal.

During the third period, Karlsson scored to cut the deficit to one, but the Penguins regained a two-goal lead with 2:02 left when Eric Fehr beat Jones on a breakaway.

San Jose tied it up in the second period when Logan Couture took a pass from Melker Karlsson and fired a shot past Murray.

Pittsburgh broke the 1938 Chicago Black Hawks' record of eight with ten U.S.-born players on a Stanley Cup winning team: Nick Bonino, Ian Cole, Matt Cullen, Brian Dumoulin, Phil Kessel, Ben Lovejoy, Kevin Porter, Bryan Rust, Conor Sheary, and Jeff Zatkoff.

The National Basketball Association's championship series followed a similar format beginning that year as well to avoid head-to-head competition against the NHL's Cup Finals.