Things were already bad for the Seattle Kraken, who have lost five games in a row entering Thursday’s home matchup with the Boston Bruins. But they aren’t getting any easier, now that Jared McCann has officially been placed on injured reserve with an upper-body injury.
Coach Dave Hakstol made it sound like the McCann injury is not that bad, but he did not give a timetable, and being that the Kraken’s top scorer is actually on IR, he will miss at least a week. Seattle is still without fellow top-liner Jaden Schwartz, so the loss of McCann—the team’s leading scorer—becomes extra painful (pun intended).
Pre-game
Yanni Gourde a game-time decision
Potentially adding to the challenge for Seattle, Yanni Gourde was not present at morning skate at Climate Pledge Arena. Hakstol called Gourde a “game-time decision” and would not disclose the reason for his unexpected absence.
Kole Lind was recalled from the AHL’s Charlotte Checkers to replace McCann on the roster, but we suspect he will be scratched if Gourde is able to go. If Gourde is not able to go, then we expect Lind to be inserted onto a line with Colin Blackwell and Mason Appleton. We shall see.
Kraken need to build on second half of previous game
The Kraken did not play well in the first half of their game against the Islanders on Tuesday and fell behind 4-0 before waking up in the second period. They flipped a switch and played much better in the second half, after Gourde scored to get them on the board (rhyming intentional).
“The two [halves] are very much connected,” Hakstol said Thursday after morning skate. “The biggest area that we didn’t execute on was entering the zone and extending that time. I mean we had five or six outnumbered situations in the first 15 minutes of that game, and I don’t know that we got a shot on goal. But more importantly, we didn’t extend that o-zone time. We were one and done in those scenarios.”
Hakstol also gave some credit to the way New York played in the neutral zone, but said Seattle consistently forced pucks into their structure. He also said the turnaround was thanks to “the decisions and the will that we had in terms of our puck possession” in the later part of the game.
The second half really was well played by the Kraken. If they can replicate that for a full 60 minutes on Thursday, they will have a good chance to win, even without McCann and (potentially) Gourde.
Boston Bruins
The Kraken and Bruins played each other a few weeks ago in Boston. That night, the Kraken came up empty on the power play, while David Pastrnak scored twice on the man advantage and led Boston to a 3-2 win.
On Thursday, the Bruins visit Seattle for the first time, and they will have one of their stars, Brad Marchand, back in the lineup after a six-game suspension for punching and swinging his stick at Tristan Jarry.
Marchand is a pest, and there’s no doubt about that, but he said Thursday morning that he understands the rules against him and needs to avoid getting himself in situations where he could be suspended again in the future. He also missed practice in Seattle Wednesday because his wife just gave birth to a baby girl, so he stayed back to help her get moved from the hospital to home. He was in a good mood Thursday morning.
“I’m sure he’s going to have a lot of jump [Thursday],” said former Bruin, Ryan Donato. “He’s such a good player and a tough guy to play against, so you got to have your head on a swivel when you’re against him, for more than one reason.”
The Bruins are in a playoff position, holding down the last wild card spot in the Eastern Conference. Coach Bruce Cassidy said that their lineup is a bit more dialed in than before, especially now that Tuukka Rask has officially retired. They know that Linus Ullmark and Jeremy Swayman are their two netminders moving forward, and their lineup feels more locked in than before with 50 games under the belt.
Ullmark will start for the Bruins against the Kraken.
Projected lineup
UPDATE: Yanni Gourde did participate in warm-ups and line rushes, so it looks like he’ll play. Here is the lineup.
The latest
The Kraken will sport special warm-up jerseys tonight, commemorating Black History Month. The jerseys will be auctioned off at the game.
The game began in thrilling fashion. Mark Giordano took a tripping penalty at :20 of the first period, putting his team immediately shorthanded. 1:22 later, Adam Larsson joined him in the box after catching Taylor Hall with a high stick and drawing blood.
Would you believe us if we told you that the Kraken not only killed the five-plus minutes of penalty time, but also came away with a 1-0 lead? It’s true!
Completely gassed after a long shift on the kill, Riley Sheahan huffed and puffed through the neutral zone with open ice ahead of him. He took the puck just across the offensive blue line and pulled up to wait for a trailing Giordano, whose penalty had just ended. Giordano had all day to pick his spot on Ullmark and sniped with Seattle’s first shot of the game.
A bit later in the frame, Charlie McAvoy narrowly missed a devastating injury. Alex Wennberg didn’t see him, and lifted his stick up. The stick got caught under McAvoy’s helmet, and lifted it off his head. McAvoy went down for a bit, but was able to recover. Scary play.
Meanwhile, Philipp Grubauer was standing on his head at the other end of the ice, turning away grade-A chance after grade-A chance throughout the first period. He almost escaped the frame without giving up a goal, but the Bruins got a very lucky bounce when the puck popped up in the air and over the net. Jeremy Lauzon tried to bat it out of the air, but didn’t get enough of it, and it dropped right on the goal line for Jake DeBrusk.
On their 24th shot in just 26:47 of total game time, David Pastrnak wired a one-timer from the left dot. Despite Grubauer being on top of his game at this point, there was no chance he was stopping that one.
The Kraken answered to make it 2-2 at 13:19. Off a broken play in the neutral zone, Seattle found itself on a three-on-one. Marcus Johansson passed to Jordan Eberle, and defenseman Mike Reilly just kept backing up. So, Eberle cleverly took the ice that was being offered and walked all the way into the crease before he dangled to his backhand and lofted it over a sprawling Ullmark.
NHL Video Highlight – Jordan Eberle scores against the Boston Bruins to make it 2-2. pic.twitter.com/P0bZ93PxGV
By the time the teams went to the dressing rooms after the second horn, Grubauer had already made 29 saves on the night.
Third period highlights
We didn’t forget to write anything in the third period, but compared to the hectic first two periods, it felt like little happened in the final frame of regulation. Things tightened up a lot defensively, so there just wasn’t anything all that noteworthy. The score remained 2-2, and after 60 minutes, we headed for overtime.
Overtime highlights
There was only one overtime highlight. This was it:
Thursday night, the Kraken will host the world-famous Boston Bruins at Climate Pledge Arena to try and put an end to a five-game losing streak.
Boston is the fifth original six team to visit Seattle, if you’re into that stuff. Even if you don’t care about history, the ‘B’ on their jerseys entices a ton of emotions, and some of those may be negative. The Bruins have had their share of rough and tumble teams over the years and the ‘Big, Bad Bruins’ stigma still follows them around.
That has been tamed somewhat, but Thursday will be the return of Brad Marchand, who is very skilled and has had his run-ins with players, teams, and officials throughout the league. Thursday will be his first game back after serving a six-game suspension for losing the proverbial ‘it’ against the Pittsburgh Penguins and their goalie Tristan Jarry.
“A lot of punches are thrown throughout the league and through games… that’s part of hockey and I didn’t expect it to get to where it went,” Marchand said after the Bruins morning skate on Thursday.
He also added that he knows he doesn’t have a long leash with the refs and that he’s going to keep the rage in check moving on.
“What I’m taking away from this is my threshold is very low right now,” Marchand said. “I really just have to stay away from anything at all, which I can do, I have been able to do it for a number of years now. And again, it’s just wrapping my mind around that and accepting it, whether I agree with it or not, and moving forward within the rules that I now understand are set for me. So, I think that’s essentially what it is, just making sure that I just stay away from everything because that’s where my threshold is at this point.”
It’s easy to root against Marchand if you’re a fan of a team that he’s playing against, but he undoubtedly is one of the best characters/pests the game has ever seen. He missed Wednesday’s practice to be back in Boston for the birth of his daughter, Rue.
How can you not like that?
The Perfection Line no more?
Marchand, for years, made up part of the so-called ‘Perfection Line, with center Patrice Bergeron and the always entertaining and noted donut pitchman, David Pastrnak.
It was one of the top lines in hockey but Thursday will be broken up, at least at the start of the game.
Head coach Bruce Cassidy has Marchand and Bergeron on the line together, but Pastrnak will play with Taylor Hall and Erik Haula, which in its own right is a formidable line.
Bruins odds and ends
Boston is a middle-of-the-pack team offensively, averaging 2.88 goals per game while allowing 2.74. That will pose as a challenge for the already offensively struggling Kraken who will play tonight without Jared McCann and potentially Yanni Gourde (who will be a game-time decision).
Linus Ullmark will start in net for the Bruins.
Northwest connections
Boston bruising defenseman Brandon Carlo played his junior hockey with the Tri-City Americans from 2013 through 2016. One of his teammates for the 2015-16 season in Kennewick was Kraken center Morgan Geekie.
Ullmark played for the Buffalo Sabres prior to signing with the Bruins as a free agent in the offseason. While with the Sablres, his goalie coach was Kraken goalie coach Andrew Allen. Will that help Kraken shooters? Probably not, but still a fun fact
DeBrusk played his junior hockey mostly with the Swift Current Broncos, but during the 2016 WHL trade deadline came very close to being traded to the Seattle Thunderbirds. Seattle was eventually outbid for him by the Red Deer Rebels who were loading up that year to host the Memorial Cup. So, while not a clear-cut Northwest connection, DeBrusk checks in as an almost Northwesterner.
It’s a long episode, but a fantastic one. This week, the Sound Of Hockey welcomes the coaches of both local WHL teams, as those teams prepare to play one another in the Battle of the Sound at Climate Pledge Arena on Saturday.
With Dennis Williams of the Everett Silvertips, the guys discuss the continued success of that organization, the high-end prospects that have played for them, and the many hats that Williams wears as both the GM and head coach. Then O’Dette expresses his excitement to finally be a friend of the pod and shares the differences between coaching in the ECHL versus the WHL. He also talks about the skill on his current team and the impact that some new additions have made this season.
Both interviews are great.
Aside from those interviews, you’ll also hear some Kraken talk, as John, Andy, and Darren discuss Seattle’s recent fruitless Canadian road trip and a strange home game against the New York Islanders. John also shares some tidbits from a recent presentation made by Tod and Tim Leiweke about the state of the franchise.
After the interviews, the guys shift to segments, which feature You Don’t See That Every Day, Weekly One-Timers, and Three Stars.
There was a point during Tuesday’s 5-2 Kraken loss to the Islanders when we thought we were headed for one of the worst Seattle performances of the season. The boys brought that bad of an effort and level of execution to start the game, but then they turned it on and showed once again why fans should continue to throw their support behind them, despite their stranglehold on last place. These guys do not quit.
In the end, though, Seattle had dug too big of a hole for itself, falling behind 4-0 before waking up midway through the second period and making a game of it.
Here are our Three Takeaways from the two very different 30-minute contests that were played Tuesday between the Islanders and the Kraken.
Takeaway #1: A tale of two games
The Kraken looked completely—and we mean completely—lifeless through the first half of this hockey game. Five minutes into the second period, Seattle had still registered just four shots on goal, and even that felt like a generous tally.
When Yanni Gourde beat Ilya Sorokin just off an offensive zone face-off, everything in the building changed. The fans were energized, the team started skating and spending time in the offensive zone, and although it was 4-1, the play went from dreadful to exciting in the blink of an eye.
Oddly, if the Kraken had converted a second time in that second frame and gone to the dressing room down two instead of three, we think they would have tied that game before it was said and done.
“It definitely got us some momentum, and we started to string together some shifts and play to our strengths,” said Riley Sheahan of Gourde’s goal. “I think when we forecheck like we were and move the puck around in the o-zone and get it to the net and kind of build off that, I think that’s when we’re at our best. We just gotta focus on getting to that point and then once we’re there, just letting ourselves make plays and generate some energy.”
“That’s momentum,” added Hakstol. “You feel the strain of where you’re at in your home building down by four and finally get one and that just gave us a jolt of energy. From there, you know, it really was like a flip of the switch for the next 30 minutes.”
Now if only they could flip that switch before the next game starts…
Takeaway #2: Interesting personnel decisions
For the second time this season, Hakstol scratched Joonas Donskoi for this game. In his place was Austin Czarnik, who faced the team that waived him just a few weeks ago. But Donskoi’s removal was less about Czarnik and more about the play of Morgan Geekie.
With Hakstol rotating players in and out, Geekie had become an easy target to scratch in recent weeks, as he had been downright ineffective. But after a solid game Monday, Hakstol kept him in on Tuesday.
Geekie again did not score, but he narrowly missed on several occasions, including on a play when Sorokin committed highway robbery. He had just gotten leveled in the offensive zone but got up, dusted himself off, and got in alone with the New York netminder, only to get denied by a flashy glove save.
Thatcher Demko made an equally large save on Geekie on the blocker side on Monday, so maybe the next Grade-A chance should go five hole?
Anyway, it’s great that Geekie is suddenly stringing together some positive performances. We had high hopes for him coming into this season, but things haven’t panned out the way anyone expected. Let’s see if he can continue to grow his game.
Takeaway #3: Build off the second half
This loss to the Islanders was the fifth in a row for the Kraken, and it came on the heels of a three-game tour through Canada that produced zero points. Seattle did not play well in its last game of the trip in Vancouver, and the compete level from that contest carried over into Tuesday.
Not only was the effort lacking again, but the execution was not close to what it needed to be in the first 30 minutes of the game. That explained why the Kraken had just four shots on goal through about the six-minute mark of the second period.
“We weren’t really getting out of our zone in the first period,” Gourde said. “By the end of the second and in the third, we played way more in the o-zone, which allowed way more shots… Our F3 was responsible and allowed our D to go down the wall.”
With every losing streak, a team needs to bottom out and then take baby steps toward righting the ship. This is certainly not the first losing streak Seattle has been on, and they’ve always eventually gotten themselves out, but not before an especially bad stretch of play. The first period of Tuesday’s game felt like rockbottom (we hope) for this skid.
From Gourde’s goal on, we were back to seeing the tenacious team we’re used to seeing at Climate Pledge Arena, and that is certainly something the team can build upon as it takes on Boston on Thursday.
“There’s nothing that I’d throw into print in terms of moral victories,” Hakstol said. “But pride and pushing and performing and sticking with it? Yeah, absolutely, there is something very important in that.”
