The Seattle Kraken are on a five-game losing streak and sinking farther out of playoff contention with every passing defeat, but you wouldn’t have known it at Wednesday’s practice at Kraken Community Iceplex.
The team returned to home ice for the first time since a dreadful four-game road trip on which it notched just one standings point out of a possible eight and never led a game. Yet the players were hooting and hollering over good plays and goals, the coach was in a positive mood when talking to media, and there was a buzz in the air with the arrival of newly recalled top defensive prospect, Ryker Evans.
Heck, even the assessment of the recent games from some of the players was more upbeat than one might have expected.
“The last two games, I don’t feel like we got outplayed or anything,” Pierre-Edouard Bellemare said. “I think we created those terrible bounces. I mean, Ottawa was two kind of flukes of bounces, but there’s still two turnovers that created two goals and we lost 2-0, right?
“And then last game, we didn’t start the game like we were supposed to at all, and we fed their attack by just literally giving them the puck. So that being said, what do you do to change that game? Because besides those [mishaps], we actually played pretty decently in those games.”
So, if you were panicking about the outlook of Seattle’s season, it may bring you some solace to know that the team is far from panicked at this point. Instead, the players and coach seemed excited to get back home and go back to work Thursday against the New Jersey Devils.
Overcoming Seattle’s scoring struggles
The Kraken’s offensive struggles became magnified on the road trip when the team failed to overcome several bad bounces. That Ottawa game was the best example. Seattle had plenty of chances against Anton Forsberg but couldn’t get even one puck past him. Meanwhile, a blown tire and a miscommunication in the defensive zone was all the Senators needed to score the game’s only two goals.
“We work extremely hard to get a goal, and then we give up a goal [way] too easily,” Bellemare said. “The mistakes are way too high, and then when we play good, it’s not high enough.”
Eeli Tolvanen, whose line with Yanni Gourde and Oliver Bjorkstrand was easily Seattle’s best forward group during the trip, shared a similar assessment to Bellemare. “I felt like we’ve played pretty well other than the first period in Montreal,” Tolvanen said. “But yeah, they’re tough losses. You don’t want to lose too many in a row, but I feel like if you look at some of the games, we created a lot.”
Tolvanen said that if they keep playing the way they’ve been playing, the Kraken will start getting results soon.
“The Ottawa game, we had two individual [bad breaks], like Matty loses an edge, and they get a breakaway out of it. Stuff happened like that but other than that, I feel like we’ve played pretty well. If we just keep going that way, I feel like we’re going to win more than lose.”
Coach Dave Hakstol was a bit more surgical in his breakdown of what needs to change for Seattle.
“We have to identify some of the areas where we need improvement,” Hakstol said. “And defensively, we’re pretty happy with everything, [though] there are always improvement areas that we can do better in. But if you look at it offensively, there’s two or three categories that we obviously need to improve.”
When Seattle came home from its first east coast road trip of the season with a 2-1-1 record, a couple breaks in the other direction, and the Kraken could have been feeling very bad about themselves at that point. That is what happened on this trip. As Hakstol highlighted, the margins on the trip were again slim, so some more offense generation in a few areas, and the results could have been more palatable.
“When you look over the long haul, statistically, one or two more opportunities, on your out-numbered rushes, one or two more opportunities from the slot in good areas, one more rebound for us takes us from bottom of the league to top of the league,” Hakstol said. “So, those are some of the areas that we’ve identified, and we know that we need to work and improve it.”
Evans arrives
At some point, when things are going badly for a team, a personnel change is needed to get things heading back in the right direction. Evans, the smooth-skating 21-year-old defenseman, represents such a change, although it remained unclear Wednesday if he would immediately slot into the lineup against New Jersey.
The top three defense pairs remained in tact, while Evans skated with Jaycob Megna, who has been a healthy scratch for every Kraken game so far this season.
Hakstol confirmed Evans is here “for a reason,” though, meaning he should expect to play during his stint with the big club. But the coach wouldn’t tip his hand about his plans for Thursday’s game.
“He’s done a nice job, worked really hard,” Hakstol said of Evans. “With his development coming off an outstanding year last year and an excellent training camp this year a good start to his year down there. So this is a great time coming into this homestand to add him to our group.”
We were on the record predicting Evans would make the Kraken roster out of training camp, but he ended up as the final cut from the blue line and was sent to Coachella Valley. There, he has notched eight points in 18 games this season after a dazzling 44-point campaign in 2022-23.
Evans is excited for his NHL debut, whenever that may come, and hopes he can bring a spark to the floundering Kraken.
“I like to use my skating, moving the puck up and joining the rush,” Evans said. “So, just [I’ll just be] playing my game, moving my feet.”
Burakovsky “real close” to returning
Speaking of things Hakstol wouldn’t confirm or deny, Andre Burakovsky practiced in full Wednesday and skated on a line with Alex Wennberg and Jared McCann. It was the winger’s first time taking line rushes since suffering an upper-body injury in Seattle’s 4-1 loss to the New York Rangers on Oct. 21.
Hakstol wouldn’t say he expected Burakovsky to be available Thursday, but signs are pointing toward an imminent return to game action.
“He’s been champing at the bit now for the last couple of days, but we’re making sure we take all the right steps,” Hakstol said.
Like with Evans, the Kraken are surely hoping Burakovsky can help jumpstart the Kraken offensively.
“[Burakovsky] is one of the guys on our roster that helps generate offense, and he can generate it on his own,” Hakstol said. “So the pace that he brings, and some of his creativity offensively will be a nice addition to our lineup.”
Goalie Gear Corner
While we are on the record saying we’ve grown tired of the brown leather look for outdoor games and other throwback uniform scenarios, Philipp Grubauer’s new setup for the Winter Classic is beautiful. The deep sea and ice blue accents really make the gear pop on the ice, and it should look great with Seattle’s jerseys.
None of that was encouraging.
“…we actually played pretty decently in those games.”
Two goals in 120 minutes against two of the worst teams in the East!
If that’s the attitude of this team coming home – where they’ve typically struggled – to play six in ten days… Wow!
A Megna/Evans third pairing is worth a try, I say. You have a responsible veteran who is used to playing with an offensive-minded guy who is prone to defensive mistakes and a young guy who looks like a big time difference-maker in the offensive zone but who may be prone to making mistakes now and again. That’s a formula that has worked. It worked for Megna and Karlsson. It worked for Adam Larsson and Vince Dunn. I want to see that on the ice again. Megna and Evans will make each other better.
Doubtful they would put Ryker out with Megna. They would likely pair him with one of the regulars
By the way, who else wants to see a McCann/Wright/Burakovsky line? It worked last year when Hakstol put the rookie between the two best wingers on the team (McCann/Beniers/Eberle). Why not try it again?
I have heard folks say that it wouldn’t be good for Wright’s development to take him out of an environment where he is currently thriving, but I think that he is good enough to play top minutes in the big league, especially if he will be playing between two wingers who other teams have to respect. If Wright can handle it, that’s a path to NHL stardom.
One other thing…
The podcasts are the best. I’ve listened to each and every episode and not a single one has ever disappointed. Always outstanding.
Today there was a comparison of this season’s goaltending to last season’s goaltending… and they are very similar. This actually isn’t surprising. The inference seemed to be that goaltending is not the problem. I agree… somewhat. Goaltending isn’t the problem in that it’s not what has changed. Last season’s goaltending was just as poor as this season’s goaltending… but the team was scoring more. Through 25 games last season the Kraken scored 16 more goals than this season. Considering how close many of the games have been, it seems pretty obvious the drop-off in scoring is what’s showing up in the standings… not the goalies. But what it also means is our NHL No.3 goalie payroll has to have NHL Top 3 scoring in order to win games. That seems ridiculous. The goaltending isn’t “bad” – or horrible like season one – but it isn’t good either. It certainly isn’t third in the league, which is what it’s priced at… and that’s why people are frustrated with Grubauer.
“Goaltending isn’t the problem” should really be “goaltending isn’t the ONLY problem” — it’s just as bad as it was last year, but like you say, it just hasn’t been masked by the offense this season. .890 goaltending should never be considered sufficient. In fact, something just popped up on prohockeyrumors in the last day that the Kraken are looking for goalie help. Clearly, GMRF thinks it’s a problem!
The two teams each side of the Kraken in the standings, the Wild and the Oilers, both fired their coaches and are on 4-game and 5-game win streaks. It is time Seattle did the same.
The other issue is the roster. Instead of going with Wright and Evans and re-signing Sprong (combined cap hit $3.8m) Francis lost more cap space to find a top gun by signing Dumoulin, Yamamoto, and Bellamere (combined cap hit $5.4m). Not great use of the cap.
At the TDL, they should trade Dumoulin, Schultz, Driedger or Grubauer, Bellemare, Wennberg, and Eberle. All could have a role for a playoff-bound team. That could net anywhere from 6 to 10 additional draft picks and save lots of cap space for landing the requisite offensive talent for next season.
Bobby, I dare to disagree considering you have a great hockey name from the Bruins. Any relation to you.? Both Edmonton and Minnisota have had 3 terrible seasons including the Kraken beating Edmonton in the playoffs with a top line that only we dare dream to have. In this case it is too early for a firing of Haskol since he did such a great job with the team last year. The Kraken have been competitive all year. Coaches do not score goals, hit posts and fail to check and are not responsible for injuries. This is on each individual player. I like your suggestion of trading but in the real world, other GM’s will be trying to steal players due to their salary cap issues. Giving players aways for 4,5 or 6 rounders is not going to happened at the moment. The trading deadline is months away and the Kraken should feel fortunate that they got one great year with players that were discarded during expansion. We were real lucky to beat both Edmonton and Colorado last year and letting players that contributed to that success go is also not on the Coach. I do not see the Kraken firing Haskol this year, no matter what happens. I look forward to a rebuild year next year. I hope you do to.
The Kraken didn’t play the Oilers in the playoffs last year…
oops
I was a bit surprised to find between last season and this season the Kraken are 8-5 at home in the first game following a road trip. A road trip is two or more away games. That and the fact New Jersey isn’t coming in on a losing streak and I think we’ve got a chance tonight.
Go Kraken!!!
this made me giggle. Thank you. Go Kraken!
You’re welcome.