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Three Takeaways: Bobby McMann scores twice in debut, Kraken win 5-2 over Canucks

Darren Brown

McMann (twice) AND McCann scored?! Of course they did. 

The Seattle Kraken did what they had to do against the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday and picked up two SORELY needed standings points to keep themselves right in the playoff hunt, though they remain on the outside for now. 

In this one, the Kraken got solid goaltending from Philipp Grubauer, who made 32 saves, and a huge performance from their newly assembled top line of Jordan Eberle (three assists), Matty Beniers (one goal, two assists), and the famed savior of the franchise Bobby McMann (two goals, one assist) in his Seattle debut.

Here are Three Takeaways from a 5-2 Kraken win over the Vancouver Canucks. 

Takeaway 1: Bobby McMann makes a HUGE impact

In a way, Sound Of Hockey has oddly become the foremost source for all things Bobby McMann over the last week and change, practically publishing a daily article about the new Kraken forward. We promise that won’t be the case moving forward…

Unless he makes an impact in every game he plays.

“It almost resembles, in a way, your first game,” McMann said. “You’ve got an entirely new group, new organization, new fans. You want to make a great first impression. Sometimes things go your way a little bit more than other nights. And luckily, that was tonight for me.”

So far, so good after Game 1 of the Bobby McMann Era. In this one, he was physical early, which surely helped him get involved in the action right away after sitting out for almost two weeks between getting scratched for a couple games due to roster management in Toronto and then the whole visa debacle after his trade.

But the more memorable plays from this game came when McMann got himself on the scoresheet for the first and second time as a Kraken and the 20th and 21st time on aggregate this season.

The first one was a critical goal in the game, too. After Evander Kane had tied the score 1-1 at 11:42 of the first period, it looked like Seattle was headed to the dressing room tied and (probably) again questioning itself. Instead, McMann made a simple play to throw the puck toward the net while Shane Wright crashed toward Nikita Tolopilo.

While it initially looked like Wright may have gotten a piece of it, replay showed the puck went straight off McMann’s stick and into Tolopilo, who—in the confusion with Wright barreling down the slot—slid himself right into the net, regaining the lead for the Kraken and building some good feelings heading to the dressing room.

“Yeah, I didn’t know [I scored],” McMann said. “I thought he tipped it maybe, because I didn’t know if that one was going in with the shot that I had. So it was more of a pass to him, but I think it just fooled the goalie, because I think he just missed it.”

McMann followed that up by showing impressive chemistry with his linemates, driving to the net off a 3-on-2 rush with Eberle and Beniers. Eberle threaded a beautiful pass through the legs of Linus Karlsson to McMann for an easy backdoor tap-in to make it 4-1 at 4:14 of the third.

Tack on a second assist for McMann on Beniers’ goal to make it 5-1, and that was one heck of a debut.

Takeaway 2: Risk and reward of defense joining the rush

On rush opportunities, the Kraken like activating a defenseman to add an extra passing option. This can lead to prime scoring chances, but it can also expose the team defensively if a pass misconnects or a shot goes wide and rattles out of the zone.

In this game, we saw both the benefit and the cost of having a D-man join the rush. After Jared McCann had broken his 10-game goalless drought and given the Kraken a 1-0 lead 4:12 into the game, it looked like he had another chance brewing seven minutes later. McCann drove into the offensive zone on the left flank but got steered into the boards and stripped of the puck by Zeev Buium.

Meanwhile, Brandon Montour had jumped up in the play to give McCann an extra target, but Montour’s partner, Ryan Lindgren, got a few feet too far up ice to cover for Montour. As the Canucks transitioned, Kane got behind both Lindgren and Montour and cruised in for a breakaway goal.

But on the other side of the coin, we also saw why it can be a benefit to have a defenseman in the rush. As a 3-on-2 developed for Eberle, Beniers, and Berkly Catton, Jamie Oleksiak hustled to get himself into scoring position in the slot. Now with a 4-on-2 advantage, Beniers found Oleksiak fully uncovered in the middle and dished to the Big Rig, who picked a spot on Tolopilo and ripped it past him.

“The play at the blue line was the issue,” coach Lane Lambert said about what led to the Kane goal. “What you want to have is… I mean, at the end of the day, you need your defensemen to jump, you need to create outnumbered rushes, but it has to be with some layers. And so if something happens and that puck does get turned over, we need the opposite side defenseman potentially to protect the middle of the ice. They got behind us a couple of times… It’s just something that we’ve got to make sure that we are a little better at.”

Takeaway 3: Kraken stay afloat

The Kraken were incredibly desperate for points coming into this game, and they took care of business against a bad Vancouver team. There was a period of time in the evening when Seattle had fallen three points out of a playoff spot after the San Jose Sharks defeated the Montreal Canadiens 4-2 on the road.

After losing four straight, Seattle had really put itself behind the eight ball. This win over Vancouver stops the bleeding, at least momentarily, and gets them back to one point out of the last wild card.

Because of the team’s recent ineptitude, every game will feel borderline must-win from here on out. Back to work Sunday against the Stanley Cup champs.

Darren Brown

Darren Brown is the Chief Content Officer at soundofhockey.com and the host of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast. He is a member of the PHWA and is also usually SOH’s Twitter intern (but please pretend you don’t know that). Follow him @DarrenFunBrown and @sound_hockey or email darren@soundofhockey.com.

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