If hindsight is 20/20, then foresight is a superpower. The Seattle Kraken are firmly planted in last place in the Pacific Division and look like a more traditional expansion team than many expected. With that in mind, there have been a lot of folks trying to figure out where the team’s front office went wrong with the work it did in building the inaugural roster.
While we’re disappointed that things have gone sideways in this first season, we always knew this was a possibility. Assembling a group of mostly spare parts from other teams could have produced a winner, as it did in Vegas, but with so many unknowns entering 2021-22, we were braced for a tough on-ice start for the franchise. Sadly, that is what we’ve gotten, as any cautious optimism has been quashed.
In hindsight, we’re thankful that the Kraken front office had the foresight to also recognize that a bad first season was plausible. We still believe general manager Ron Francis and his staff built a good foundation for sustained success in the future, but they also were clever in leaving themselves an escape hatch in case this first season didn’t pan out the way they hoped.
That escape hatch came in the form of selecting players with minimal term left on their respective contracts and signing free agents to one-year deals. As it stands currently, the Kraken only have 15 players under contract for 2022-23, including those on their taxi squad and those with the AHL’s Charlotte Checkers. That number does not include the 10 players set to become restricted free agents, with whom the Kraken have exclusive negotiating rights, assuming they extend qualifying offers.
For context, NHL teams are allowed to give out up to 50 contracts at any one time, so even if they sign all 10 of their RFA’s to extensions, the Kraken still would only be halfway to the maximum number of allowable contracts.
Also worth taking into account, the Kraken currently share their AHL affiliate with the Florida Panthers. The Coachella Valley Firebirds are supposed to begin play in 2022-23 and are expected to be the exclusive AHL affiliate of the Kraken, so many more players will have to be added to the system in the relative near future.
With all this in mind, the Kraken are poised to look drastically different in 2022-23, as the front office has a mountain of decisions to make in the coming months. We figured this would be as good a time as any to look at the current roster and get an idea of which players could return next season and which could be on the move.
Players under contract
Let’s get this group out of the way quickly. These are the players that are under contract through next season and are currently on the Kraken’s NHL roster. Assuming no trades of these players, they are expected to still be Kraken in 2022-23.
Not currently on the NHL roster are Luke Henman, whose contract expires after 2023-24, and Joey Daccord, who is signed through next season. Both of those players will become RFA’s after their contracts end.
Unrestricted free agents
Here’s where decision making will have to come sooner rather than later for the Kraken brass. There are five players on the team’s current NHL roster that are set to become unrestricted free agents after this season. If the Kraken don’t re-sign these players before free agency officially opens in July, they are free to sign anywhere they want.
Do any of these players offer enough value to contending teams to fetch trade offers prior to the March 21 trade deadline? Do the Kraken want these players back after this season? If so, is there mutual interest from these individuals in continuing their respective tenures in deep-sea blue sweaters?
It’s just our hunch, but with the team struggling as much as it has, we would expect Francis to listen to any offers he receives on what would be rental players for other teams.
Mark Giordano
Current cap hit: $6,750,000
Surely the Kraken wouldn’t name a captain in their first season, only to trade him at the deadline, would they?
Well, if one player can bring value on the rental market, it’s Giordano. He’s a former Norris Trophy winner, he’s a leader, and he does the kinds of things teams salivate over for deep playoff runs. We also knew all along that with his age, his captaincy would be relatively short lived, even if he ended up playing in Seattle beyond this season.
One challenge is that Giordano has a modified no-trade clause, so he will have some control over where he goes. Still, at 38 years old, we have to think he would be open to a move to a contending team.
Calle Jarnkrok
Current cap hit: $2,000,000
Two-way forward, Calle Jarnkrok, 30, had a tough start to his Kraken tenure. He began the season by getting COVID-19, then went without a single point in his first 12 games. He finally broke out with a goal and an assist on Nov. 21 against Washington, only to get injured the following game against Carolina and miss two more weeks.
Jarnkrok has turned it on of late, though. He looks like a different player now and has averaged a point per game over Seattle’s last nine contests. He could end up having a pretty good statistical season if he can stay healthy, especially if coach Dave Hakstol continues playing him with Yanni Gourde.
He also has 63 career playoff games under his belt with Nashville, so with his affordable cap hit, we think teams could inquire about Jarnkrok.
Marcus Johansson
Current cap hit: $1,500,000
Marcus Johansson was one of those later-in-the-summer free agent signings by the Kraken, as they looked to fill out the rest of their roster prior to training camp.
On a one-year deal, we saw Johansson as a depth addition at the time. But the veteran forward has played a more significant role than we anticipated, including getting plenty of power play time—he’s been a big contributor as the net-front guy—and playing in the top six for a lot of the season.
Johansson has 97 career playoff games, and folks seem to remember his impressive performance during Boston’s 2018-19 Stanley Cup Final run, when he had 11 points in 22 games.
Still, despite getting plenty of opportunity, Johansson only has nine points on the season. So, will we see him back in a Kraken uniform next year?
This one could go either way. If Seattle can get him back on a similar contract for another year or two, we think they’d take him. But we also think Francis will be able to replace Johansson if other teams come calling, or if they can’t find a team-friendly extension.
Colin Blackwell
Current cap hit: $725,000
Forward Colin Blackwell had something of a breakout season with the Rangers in 2020-21, registering 12 goals and 10 assists in 47 games. That led to his selection by the Kraken in the Expansion Draft.
He has had a similar first half to Jarnkrok, though. He started the season on injured reserve after missing all of training camp with a nagging lower-body injury. He then got COVID and missed most of December. He also has found himself in the press box as a healthy scratch on several occasions, but now on the line with Jarnkrok and Gourde, Blackwell seems to have found a home.
We don’t expect too many callers for Blackwell at the deadline. But if he can continue to build and be a regular player on a contributing line, we don’t see why the Kraken wouldn’t bring Blackwell back, especially if they can get him for around $1 million.
Riley Sheahan
Current cap hit: $850,000
Depth forward Riley Sheahan has been exactly what we expected him to be. A good soldier and a responsible two-way center, Sheahan plays a simple and quintessential fourth-line game. There are probably players out there with more offensive upside that can replace Sheahan, but it doesn’t hurt the Kraken to keep him around beyond this season.
He did pass through waivers and had a brief stint in the AHL this season as well, so if anything, he can provide some veteran leadership to the Firebirds in 2022-23.
Max McCormick
Current cap hit: $750,000
Max McCormick is another player like Riley Sheahan. He has filled in well on the fourth line when given the opportunity, but there isn’t a ton of offensive upside. He’s in a similar spot to Sheahan in that he has played his role admirably, but if he doesn’t return, there are other players out there that can replace him.
Restricted free agents
With restricted free agents, the Kraken hold most of the cards. Assuming Seattle wants these guys back, it can keep them; it’s just a matter of how long and for what price.
To keep their rights, Seattle just has to extend qualifying offers to these players. This means something equal to or higher than their previous salary, with some slight variations in the rules depending on what they made before.
The player can either reject or accept the qualifying offer, but once the qualifying offer is made, the player can really only sign with Seattle.
All of the Kraken players set to become RFA’s do have arbitration rights, but even if negotiations get to that point, it becomes guaranteed that a deal will get done for one more year. Arbitration hearings are rare, as most negotiations get settled before getting to that contentious stage.
Here are the players that will be RFA’s after this season:
Jared McCann
From this list, we want to focus on a few individuals, with the first being Jared McCann. Talk about a guy who has flourished with an expanded role, McCann appears to be the steal of the Expansion Draft for the Kraken. He has already set a career high for goals and has more than three months of hockey left to play in this campaign. He leads the Kraken in that category and is nipping at Jordan Eberle’s heels for the team scoring lead.
McCann was already getting paid relatively well, but what if he stays healthy and pots 30 goals this season? What kind of a number could he command from Seattle to keep him around long term?
Working in Seattle’s favor on this front, McCann seems to love it here. Every time we ask him about what this season has meant, he gushes over how much he appreciates the opportunities he’s gotten. With this in mind, we’re confident Francis will be able to keep McCann around for years to come. We just wonder how much he’ll have to pony up to get the budding star to remain here beyond next season.
Morgan Geekie, Mason Appleton, Jeremy Lauzon
We believe these three will be extended, and none of them should break the bank. They’ve all played admirably in their roles and have solidified themselves as regular players for the Kraken. We like Geekie’s offensive upside, Appleton’s two-way play, and Lauzon’s physicality.
Ryan Donato
The case of Ryan Donato is an interesting one. We spoke to him before the season about the bumps in the road that he had experienced in his pro hockey career, and how Seattle could provide an opportunity for him to finally take a big step forward.
He has seized that opportunity for the most part and has earned Hakstol’s trust as an every-day player. Donato is on pace to set career marks in pretty much every category, including games played, goals, and points. After bouncing from Boston to Minnesota to San Jose, we think Donato may have found a home in Seattle for the foreseeable future. Keep an eye on this one, though.
Haydn Fleury
Unless something changes with his usage in the second half of the season, we wonder if Haydn Fleury could be moved either via trade or via Seattle simply letting him get on with his career elsewhere. Stuck in a logjam on the Kraken blue line, Fleury has found himself scratched far more often than he could have anticipated entering the season.
Back on Nov. 23, Fleury was asked how his career has progressed. With a downtrodden look, he said, “Umm… I think it got better in Anaheim, and… I don’t know. I’ll leave it at that.”
So, we don’t get the sense he’s particularly thrilled with his situation.
What do you think, folks? Who stays and who goes? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.
As mid-season training camp (that’s what we’re calling this week) continued for the Seattle Kraken on Friday, the team was all smiles. The players battled, scrimmaged, and celebrated their goals against one another. With all three of their games postponed due to opponents’ COVID-related issues this week, it’s been an interesting opportunity for the Kraken to reset and hopefully clear their minds before getting back into the swing of things Monday in Colorado.
Some 3-on-3 scrimmage action for your viewing enjoyment. Jamie Oleksiak with the 🚨🚨🚨. pic.twitter.com/eCXnul7wPS
Although the schedule has been segmented by postponements and an unexpectedly long holiday break, the Kraken are still actively on a five-game losing streak. You wouldn’t know that based on the mood at Kraken Community Iceplex, where things have been upbeat and energetic.
As the Kraken march toward returning to action, a key player in Jaden Schwartz has been noticeably absent.
Jaden Schwartz out four to six weeks
Since news broke that Brandon Tanev would miss the remainder of the season after having surgery on an injured ACL, the last thing Kraken fans would have hoped to see was Jaden Schwartz going on the shelf for four to six weeks. But that has indeed happened, as the team announced Thursday that the top-line forward will have hand surgery.
#SeaKraken forward Jaden Schwartz will have surgery on his hand. He is expected to be sidelined for four to six weeks.
For a club that’s already struggling, these are two massive blows in a row. Schwartz is such an integral part of the lineup at both ends of the ice and has been a driver for this team all season long. And even looking at the line combos that coach Dave Hakstol employed at Friday’s practice, the absences of Schwartz and Tanev make the team look much thinner on all four lines.
Here are #SeaKraken lines at practice this morning…
Schwartz has six goals and 14 assists in 29 games this season and has registered more than 20 minutes of ice time on seven occasions.
Alex Wennberg is in COVID protocol, but there is a good chance he returns in time for the game against the Avalanche. That will have a significant trickle-down impact, as he likely will get inserted back into the top six. Nonetheless, somebody will need to step up to fill the new void of Schwartz, while Hakstol simultaneously looks for the right mix to backfill for Tanev.
The loss of Schwartz has perhaps the biggest effect on Jordan Eberle, who has been attached at the hip to Schwartz for much of the season. Marcus Johansson took Schwartz’s spot on the top line at Friday’s practice, skating alongside Eberle and Jared McCann.
“We’ve got JoJo with us now, and we’ve had a good week of practice here,” Eberle said Friday. “We’re going to get a lot of offensive zone chances and a lot of offensive zone shifts, so we have to find a way to create some offense, and that’s what we’re looking to do. When a guy goes down like Schwartz, you got to pick it up collectively. [There’s] not one guy [that] can do it.”
Said Hakstol, “Just as it always is with an injury, other players have to step in and do the job.”
Kraken embracing practice time
It’s downright bizarre to have this week-long break in the middle of the season, especially after the longer-than-usual holiday hiatus. The Kraken seem to be embracing the time off, though, as they have had longer on-ice sessions this week with plenty of battle and endurance drills.
“I think for us, we needed some practice time,” Eberle said. “I think you look at how the season’s gone and where we are, obviously we’re not happy with it. We’re out of a playoff spot and trending in the wrong direction. We’ve had this week to find some answers to what we’re doing wrong and obviously just get a little bit of a mental break more than anything and try to re-group as a team.”
It’s been a rare opportunity for Hakstol to really focus on fixing issues that have been plaguing his team.
“I didn’t like our last performance, so we want to leave that in the past,” Hakstol said, referring to Seattle’s Jan. 1 loss to the Vancouver Canucks. “The biggest thing is our level of togetherness and compete. Going out with good detail and competing hard through 60 minutes and being a consistent hockey team, those are the things that I’m looking for.”
Starbucks loves Grubauer
The second ice sheet at Kraken Community Iceplex is visible from the Starbucks that is housed within the facility. In one of the windows, we spotted a sign Friday that read, “Gruby is our fave customer.”
We managed to snap a photo of said favorite customer with the sign in the background (you may have to click the tweet to actually see the full photo).
We asked the Starbucks employees what makes him their favorite, and they indicated that Grubauer is the only Kraken player that stops by regularly.
Darren Brown is the Chief Content Officer at Sound Of Hockey and the host, producer, and editor of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast. He is an inconsistent beer league goalie who believes that five players have to make a mistake before the puck gets to him. Follow him on Twitter @DarrenFunBrown or email darren@soundofhockey.com.
With a break in the Seattle Kraken schedule, here is a trip around the boards, giving you some quick hits on what’s been happening with the team of late.
Game postponements
If you have not heard by now, the only game remaining on the Seattle Kraken schedule this week against the Ottawa Senators has also been postponed. The Senators added Thomas Chabot, Chris Tierney, and Zach Sanford to their COVID protocol list that already had six players on it.
The next game on the schedule will not be until Jan. 10 against the Colorado Avalanche in Denver. The Senators game postponement leaves the Kraken with seven postponed games, four home games and three road games.
With the participation of NHL players in the Winter Olympics this year officially nixed, it is a safe bet that several of the postponed games will be rescheduled during the break that was originally intended for the Olympics. That window is only 16 days, Feb. 7 to 23. If all seven games are rescheduled in that window, that will be a game every 2.3 days. That rate of days per game is consistent with the normal rate of days per game, but if we see any other cancelations, it will get tight.
The Kraken are lucky that the three away games that need to be rescheduled are all clustered in Canada so it might be possible to just add one road trip to the schedule to make up the Vancouver, Calgary, and Winnipeg games.
Here is a look at all the postponements across the league by team:
It is interesting to see that Seattle has one of the highest non-Canadian team postponements.
Seattle Kraken COVID-19 protocol list updates
Speaking of COVID, as of Monday morning, Mason Appleton was cleared off the COVID-19 protocol list and was able to practice with the team for the first time since the Christmas holiday break. Just as Appleton was coming off, Alexander Wennberg was added to the COVID protocol, joining Jeremy Lauzon who has been on since Jan. 1. With the postponement of the Ottawa game, both Lauzon and Wennberg are likely to be cleared before the Kraken head to Colorado for their next scheduled game on Monday.
Tanev surgery updates
Fan favorite and overall maniac, Brandon Tanev, underwent successful knee surgery on Dec. 30. The team is reporting that he should be ready for the start of the 2022-23 NHL season.
Brandon Tanev had successful knee surgery on Dec. 30 and is expected to return for the start of the 2022-23 NHL season.
Monday-morning quarterback: ‘What’s wrong with the Kraken?’ edition
The Kraken have certainly been struggling to get in the win column lately. After two competitive games against the Flyers and Flames last week, the Kraken never got their footing on Saturday night against the Canucks. Seems that everyone had an opinion on what is wrong with the Kraken Monday morning:
All three articles give their best guess at what is wrong, and each author’s take probably has a little truth to the Kraken’s shortcomings this season. Most of the authors reference preseason analytical models that predicted the Kraken to be a competitive playoff team, which makes me wonder if maybe the models were wrong from the start. The articles are worth a read if you want to understand some of the theories being floated around the Kraken’s cold start to the season.
In case you missed it
In the feel-good story of the week, read about how one Seattle fan might have saved the life of the Canucks’ Assistant Equipment Manager, Red Hamilton.
After alerting @Canucks Asst. Equipment Manager Brian "Red" Hamilton of a cancerous mole on his neck, the #SeaKraken & Vancouver teamed up to surprise Nadia Popovici with $10K for medical school.
Climate Pledge Arena announced they will be hosting a WHL game between the Seattle Thunderbirds and Everett Silvertips on Feb. 26. Tickets go on sale Jan. 10.
Seattle, are you ready for a 𝗕𝗮𝘁𝘁𝗹𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱? 🌊
On a 20-hour trip to Estero, FL, to play the Florida Everblades, the bus carrying the Cincinnati Cyclones broke down somewhere in rural Georgia. It was miserably humid inside the faulty coach, but going outside meant being swarmed by mosquitoes and other creepy crawlies. So the Cyclones opted to spend most of the several-hour delay inside the sweltering vehicle, where they sweated it out but at least got relief from the bugs.
As Everett Fitzhugh, now the radio play-by-play voice of the Kraken, and the team fanned themselves inside the bus, there were players that were dealing with various injuries and needed attention from the team’s trainer. “So our trainer pulled out the table and started doing treatment on the side of the road in this abandoned gas station parking lot,” Fitzhugh said with a laugh. The treatment was given, bugs be damned.
Then there was the time when—on the road back from Indianapolis—a major snowstorm had the team’s driver white-knuckling the steering wheel and keeping the speed to about 20 miles per hour on the freeway. He eventually pulled into a Wal-Mart parking lot, where the whole group slept on the bus until about 9 a.m. They then got back on the road and rolled into Cincinnati with just a couple hours to spare before a 2 p.m. home game. Remarkably, the Cyclones won that game.
This was life in the ECHL. Fitzhugh wouldn’t trade those experiences for the world.
Rising through the broadcast ranks, Fitzhugh got his start as a student calling games for the Bowling Green University Falcons. He spent time in the USHL, then the ECHL, and eventually got a mysterious email from Kraken CEO Tod Leiweke that he first ignored, assuming it was spam. He ultimately replied to the message and had a conversation with Leiweke that led to his ascension to the NHL.
The ECHL, AHL, NCAA, and CHL are all meant to develop players on the ice. But what is often forgotten is that team employees who help run operations off the ice are honing their own skills to try to reach the upper echelons of sport.
The arrival of the NHL’s 32nd franchise to the Puget Sound area has allowed dreams to come to fruition on the ice, in the broadcast booth, and in the team’s offices. Decades of hard work and perseverance for people like Fitzhugh have finally paid off, thanks to the birth of the Seattle Kraken. And while there are similarities in the paths taken to get here, each individual has a story to tell about what they went through to work at hockey’s highest level.
The juice is worth the squeeze
One of Fitzhugh’s colleagues on the airwaves is Mike Benton, the studio host you hear between periods of Kraken games on AM 950 KJR. He has many similar memories from his own days with the Stockton Thunder and Alaska Aces of the ECHL and the Everett Silvertips of the WHL.
He remembers the fear he felt when—on a ride from Medicine Hat to Calgary during the 2019-20 season—the Silvertips were jolted awake with the violent swerving of the team bus in 30-mile-per-hour winds at 2 a.m.
Benton also recalls the occasional dread of shepherding entire ECHL teams through airports to catch commercial flights and avoid canceling or delaying games due to travel mishaps. Yes, he was the radio guy, but in developmental leagues, you wear a lot of hats, and one of Benton’s hats was de facto travel manager.
Mike Benton spent six years as the director of broadcasting and public relations for the Everett Silvertips. (Photo/Everett Silvertips)
“I am begging and pleading with anybody who’s got an official airline uniform on if they could communicate to the ground control over in Denver,” Benton remembers after a team’s flight was delayed en route to its layover stop. “If the next flight can seriously hold up the doors for us and ask our airplane if they can let our team off first, because it’s going to be just a major catastrophe to then try to get flights rearranged, to get bags rearranged all of that.”
On this occasion, the airline did hold the plane, as the whole team sprinted through Denver International Airport and got on their connecting flight to Boise. As the last player stepped on board, the flight attendants closed the door and away they went.
The resources in those lower leagues are more scarce than in the NHL, but for Benton, it was worth going the extra mile—both literally and figuratively—to be able to do what he loves for a living.
“It’s the one line of work I find true happiness with,” Benton says. “For what I do and for the people that I can connect with, it’s been a dream come true for me and a great ride.”
Current experiences prepare you for future endeavors in mysterious ways
De’Aira Anderson, now the corporate communications manager for the Kraken, also fits into the category of having risen through developmental leagues to reach the pinnacle of the sport. She took a slightly different route than Fitzhugh and Benton, though. Anderson got her start in hockey as a social media intern for the University of Pittsburgh men’s ice hockey team. She later became the communications and operations director for the Syracuse men’s hockey team, before leaving the sports world for a couple of years and working for InkHouse, a media and marketing agency.
The arrival of the pandemic—terrible as it was—eventually brought a positive change for Anderson, who found herself furloughed from her position at InkHouse. “When I first started working at my old agency, I told them, ‘I probably won’t quit for anything, but if there’s one thing I definitely will quit for, it’s if I get an NHL job.’”
Unexpectedly out of work, Anderson applied for an open position with the expansion Kraken. What initially appeared to be a major bump in the road ended up being the catalyst for Anderson landing her dream job. “I tried on a whim and somehow I convinced [the Kraken] to hire me, which is awesome, and I’ve been here ever since.”
It’s funny how some moments in your career prepare you for bigger and better things later in life, and at the time you may not even realize it’s happening.
“When I was working at Syracuse, I had the fortunate ability to start their communications program for their hockey team up there,” Anderson says, referencing the introduction of Syracuse’s NCAA Division I women’s program. “The Kraken are a brand new franchise, so I got to start from the ground up and again have a heavy input on how we built our social presence and how we came up in the community.”
Sure, Syracuse University’s hockey program is a smaller operation than an NHL team, but there’s no question in Anderson’s mind that her experience there helped her get ready for her current role. And the organization that she helped build there is still going strong, as employees and interns have come and gone, following in Anderson’s footsteps with the Orange.
“I didn’t expect to be like a catalyst for other people when I was on this trailblazing path to becoming what I wanted to become,” she says. “So I think that’s kind of cool because I was like, ‘Well, I don’t think that was what I was expecting.’ I was just really focusing on myself, but having a positive impact when you’re not even trying to [impact others] is really cool.”
Developmental leagues bring development for staff as well as players
While Benton, Fitzhugh, and Anderson all took slightly different routes to the NHL, it is easy to find parallels in their respective journeys. The most glaring connection between the three is that they all found value in juggling many different roles and responsibilities. In prior positions, the teams that employed them had fewer resources, lower budgets, and a fraction of the staffing in place.
“I wore so many different hats,” Fitzhugh said of his time in the ECHL. “I was the PR director, I was a social media manager, I was on the marketing side, I was team services. I did all the travel and hotels and meals and bus schedules and all that stuff, and oh, by the way, I had to broadcast 72 games a year.”
Says Benton of his time with the Silvertips in the WHL: “There was a greater ask of me to really help grow our brand on a digital side when I wasn’t on the air, which I was very, very happy to do. Those [different responsibilities] pretty much hit on all cylinders with what I had trained for, coming up as a college student, an intern, and an entry level employee.”
Fitzhugh estimates that at the ECHL level, he did the jobs of 120 of the approximately 200 people that are now employed by the Kraken. But he sees that as a testament to the quality of talent the organization has hired and the expectations that they have for themselves. “I think it gives you such an appreciation for just how hard everyone in our organization has worked and is continuing to work to put this product on and to be the best team in the best venue in the best organization in the NHL.”
Dreams do come true
Perhaps the 20-hour bus rides or the sprints through airports are metaphors for the journeys that folks like Fitzhugh, Benton, and Anderson have been on in trying reach this level of the sport they all love so dearly. And perhaps that’s why all three were so elated when they got offered jobs to work either for the team itself or—in Benton’s case—for its broadcast partner.
So what do you do when you get the call offering you your dream job, something you’ve been striving for your entire adult life and maybe even beyond? You cry, you smile, you hug, and you call your loved ones.
Knowing she had interviewed, Anderson says her parents had been checking in daily to see if she had any news. When she finally found out she was getting hired, she called them, along with her grandma, on a group FaceTime. “They were like, ‘Oh, we know that you’re calling to tell us you got it!’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, and I am really excited!’”
Benton says he did “about 15 Tiger Woods fist pumps,” then called his wife, Amy, who had been so supportive of him chasing his dream over the years. Together, they then called their loved ones and shared the news. “It’s one of those things that you always think of and you always dream and wonder, ‘What’s it going to be like?’ You put so much hard work and so much intense passion into what you do. It’s like when the moment finally hits you, it’s almost like you have an out-of-body experience.”
Fitzhugh remembers taking the call on speaker phone and sharing the very special moment with his wife, Shelly. “We were laughing and we were crying and we were so excited,” he says. “Then the first person that I called obviously was my mom. And you know, she’s over the moon and ecstatic. She was like, ‘Oh, my son’s going into that dream job!’”
When Fitzhugh’s news went public, the first offer of congratulations came from a surprise caller. It was Ty Eigner, the head coach of the Bowling Green Falcons. “I could tell he was fighting back some emotion,” Fitzhugh says. “He was like, ‘You know, this is just as big as if it were one of our players. We’re so happy for you here at Bowling Green, and you know you are a member of Bowling Green hockey.’ So that was really really cool.”
For Fitzhugh, the journey came full circle when he received that call from Eigner. For Benton, Fitzhugh, Anderson, and dozens of other Kraken employees, a goal has been reached, and now together, they work to reach the loftiest goal of all.
Cover photo by Brian Liesse.
Darren Brown is the Chief Content Officer at Sound Of Hockey and the host, producer, and editor of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast. He is an inconsistent beer league goalie who believes that five players have to make a mistake before the puck gets to him. Follow him on Twitter @DarrenFunBrown or email darren@soundofhockey.com.
When Kraken general manager Ron Francis announced that Matty Beniers would be the team’s first-ever selection in the NHL Entry Draft, Seattle fans rejoiced. The spanking new franchise had selected a future cornerstone for the organization, a young man with skill, tenacity, and an innate ability to lead his teammates.
Among seasoned hockey fans, Beniers became a household name in the leadup to the 2021 draft and was well deserving of his No. 2 overall selection. Not only was he a central figure on an outstanding University of Michigan team, he also played a key role for Team USA at the 2021 World Junior Championship, where the Americans won gold for just the fifth time in the 44-year history of the tournament.
Aside from third-string goalie Logan Stein, Beniers was the only player on the American roster that still had draft eligibility during last year’s tournament and was the youngest player on the roster. He scored a goal and two assists in seven games and averaged 17:05 of ice time as the team’s second-line center.
In May, Beniers took a step up to the IIHF World Championship, where he played with bona fide NHL players and notched a goal and an assist in six games, helping USA to a bronze medal. He was again the youngest and only draft eligible player on that roster.
Now, in his final year of eligibility, he’s back at Team USA’s World Junior Championship training camp with eyes on a massive role for the 2022 tournament.
“I’m excited,” Beniers said Monday on a Zoom call with members of the media. “I think after last tournament— it was awesome winning gold, but you know, I think I expected a little more out of myself to contribute, and I wasn’t able to do that in the point standings. I think this year it’s the same expectation that I’m going to be kind of that guy… Hopefully I can do that for the team.”
Beniers and the Americans accomplished something truly remarkable in 2021, taking down Team Canada to bring home gold. Although much of the roster has turned over, he’s hoping the players that were part of last year’s win can build off of the experience.
“I think we did something very special last year and it was really great, awesome,” he said. “But the next thing is here, and we’re kind of starting to turn the page and not forgetting about it. But remembering what worked and what didn’t work and try to implement that into the team this year, try to do the same thing, and try to do it even better.”
Teammates follow the lead of Matty Beniers
Though captains have not been named yet, Beniers will almost certainly factor into the leadership group for Team USA as one of six players currently in camp who participated in the tournament last year. He already serves as alternate captain at Michigan in just his sophomore season, and his teammates on Team USA confirm that they look to him to pave the way.
Another player returning from last year’s gold-medal winning group is University of North Dakota defenseman Jake Sanderson, who was selected No. 5 overall by the Ottawa Senators in the 2020 NHL Entry Draft. When Sanderson was asked Monday who he viewed as the leaders on the team, he didn’t hesitate in placing Beniers at the top of his list. “He’s not the most vocal guy, but when he is, guys listen. Just how he goes about his day, he’s a leader by example just by how hard he works, and he does all the right things.”
The Wolverines team on which Beniers plays his college hockey is special. There are seven first-round draft picks on the roster—an NCAA record—including four of the top five selections in 2021. The No. 4 overall pick was Luke Hughes, who is expected to make his first appearance at the WJC with Team USA later this month. We asked Hughes about Beniers on Monday, and he said, “He’s been a great resource for me and he’s a really good leader on our team at Michigan. I think he’s going to be a really good leader here too.”
Kraken keeping an eye on Beniers’ development
After Beniers was picked by the Kraken, there was some debate as to whether he would join Seattle right away or go back to Michigan for a second season. It wasn’t a surprise, though, to see Beniers and his cohort of collegiate superstars return to Ann Arbor.
Last season was wonky on a lot of levels, from having no fans in the stands at famed Yost Arena to the Wolverines getting disqualified from the NCAA Tournament at the last second due to positive COVID tests. After posting a point per game in 2020-21, Beniers is continuing to play well at the college level as a sophomore, notching 11 goals and 11 assists in 20 games. He is tied for the lead on his star-studded team in goals and is just one point off the team lead for scoring.
He is continuing to develop as a player, and Seattle is continuing to keep tabs from afar. Beniers says Troy Bodie, director of hockey and business operations for the Kraken’s future Palm Springs AHL affiliate, has been checking in with him regularly. “He’s kind of their development guy,” he says of Bodie. “He’s been to games and just mentions little things I can work on, but nothing too crazy.”
It’s a delicate balance for NHL teams to allow their drafted players to go through the process with their current teams and avoid interfering too much. “I think they understand we’ve got great coaches at Michigan where I’m playing, and [those coaches are] there every night, they’re there to help, and they kind of trust those guys that they’re going to help developing me and get me better. Once they kind of pass the torch, I’ll start to get more insight from the Kraken and what they think.”
So what does Beniers need to do to prepare himself for the jump to the NHL? “I think it’s just continue to get bigger, stronger, faster. The NHL, it’s a really fast-paced game. Everyone’s bigger and stronger and they’re all fighting to keep their job… I think that’s the biggest focus right now, and it’s always tough during the season to do that.”
Darren Brown is the Chief Content Officer at Sound Of Hockey and the host, producer, and editor of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast. He is an inconsistent beer league goalie who believes that five players have to make a mistake before the puck gets to him. Follow him on Twitter @DarrenFunBrown or email darren@soundofhockey.com.
Nobody said it would be easy for the Seattle Kraken to snap its miserable six-game skid, especially against a top-flight team like the Washington Capitals. And it certainly was not easy, but snap it they did on Sunday, as Philipp Grubauer was the guy that everyone expected him to be when he was splashily signed as a free agent in the offseason.
Kraken captain Mark Giordano had been saying for about a week that the group would have to “grind out” a victory to get off this losing streak. Meanwhile, we’ve been saying that Grubauer would have to steal a win for his team, something to help the guys build some belief that not every mistake has to end up in Seattle’s net.
Both happened on Sunday. Grubauer bailed his team out on countless occasions, and the players in front of him returned the favor by selling out to block shot after painful shot in the third period.
The result was a desperately needed 5-2 Kraken win over the Capitals and some good feelings for Seattle for the first time since Nov. 4. Here are our takeaways.
Takeaway #1: Kraken get the bail-out save(s) they’ve so sorely needed
When Jeremy Lauzon coughed up the puck to Evgeny Kuznetsov behind the Kraken net, and Tom Wilson buried Kuznetsov’s pass just 3:34 into the game, there was a palpable sense of, Welp… here we go again, throughout Climate Pledge Arena.
When Morgan Geekie coughed it up to Connor McMichael at the offensive blue line six minutes later, and McMichael skated in unmolested toward Philipp Grubauer, fans in attendance prepared themselves to have the air completely sucked out of the building.
But that didn’t happen. For the first time in… well, we don’t really know how long… the Kraken got the save that bailed them out after a bad mistake. Grubauer dropped into the butterfly and kicked away McMichael’s shot.
Philipp Grubauer sweeps the puck off his goal line Sunday against the Capitals. (Photo/Brian Liesse)
“We make a mistake, and all of a sudden— it’s not quite a clear-cut breakaway, but it’s a heck of a save at the right time,” said coach Dave Hakstol after the game. “That’s important. So Grubi gets us through that first period, and we feel good coming out of that period. A lot of it has to do with that save, and then the work he did on the PK to finish out the period.”
Saves like the one on McMichael have been few and far between for the Kraken and are so important for the team’s confidence that the goalie has its back if it screws something up. From that save on McMichael onward, the Kraken morphed back into the team they aspire to be, relentless on the forecheck and willing to simply outwork an elite team.
Grubauer had been showing signs of improvement recently, but he took an enormous step on Sunday, turning away 37 of the 39 shots he faced and rescuing his team from Alex Ovechkin and his band of offensive stars.
Takeaway #2: The line shuffling works to perfection
After the Kraken lost 7-3 to Colorado on Friday in a mostly lifeless (except for the third period) effort, it was not a surprise to see Hakstol shuffle up his lines again for Sunday’s game against the Capitals. What was a bit surprising was his decision to split Schwartz up from the red-hot Jordan Eberle, with whom Schwartz had formed obvious chemistry.
In the shakeup, Schwartz was moved to a line with Yanni Gourde and Calle Jarnkrok. We surmised via the Twitter machine that the shift may have actually been an effort to get Jarnkrok going offensively, as he had not registered a single point in his 12 games this season. Jarnkrok got the second assist on Adam Larsson’s first goal as a Kraken, and from then on looked like a completely different player. He was flying around the ice, and deservedly scored a beautiful goal seven minutes later.
Schwartz stole a puck at Seattle’s blue line and sped through the neutral zone with Jarnkrok on his flank. He dished to Jarnkrok, who delayed, cut to the middle, and rifled it into the top corner.
And so… Jarnkrok is going. “It felt good,” he said of contributing offensively to an important win. “It took a little longer than I wanted it to, but it was a great team win.”
On the new look to the forward lines, Hakstol said, “Part of the thought process, [Johansson] and [Wennberg] playing together have some pretty good chemistry, and we have [Eberle] on that line, so you’ve got a guy on that line that can finish as well. With [Schwartz] going with [Jarnkrok] and Yanni [Gourde], those two guys play a certain way, and we felt Schwartzy with them would add to what that group does on the offensive side. And they’re going to defend well, they’re going to play hard and tenacious without the puck.”
Schwartz didn’t miss a beat without Eberle, scoring a goal and three assists on the night and rudely stealing first-star honors away from Grubauer.
Eberle saw his point streak end at seven games, but halting the losing streak at six games was clearly more important. Though he missed the scoresheet, Eberle still looked dangerous every time he touched the puck, especially in the second period.
We’ll go out on a limb and guess that assuming no injuries, these lines will stick for Wednesday’s game against Carolina.
Takeaway #3: Kraken reward fans for sticking with them
In the last “Three Takeaways,” we wrote about the response of the fans in the third period on Friday. When Seattle scored its first goal to make it 7-1, Climate Pledge Arena erupted as if it was the biggest goal the team had ever scored.
There was an underlying theme to Sunday’s post-game media availability that the gutsy 5-2 Kraken win over the Capitals—a game in which players were throwing themselves in front of every slapshot, and Grubauer was standing on his head—was for the fans.
Grubauer joked that he’s played in places where the crowd will “throw beer cans at you” for performances like Friday against the Avs, so the guys wanted to repay Kraken fans for their support against the Capitals on Sunday.
“Coming out of two nights ago, that hockey game… that stings,” added Hakstol. “That stings and that stays with you. The atmosphere in our building also stays with you. There’s probably a little bit of that mindset of how much support we had two nights ago on a really crappy night. And then to be able to come out tonight and do what we could to try to reward the people up there, and most importantly really take pride in our standard tonight, and that’s what happened.”
Now it’s up to Seattle to build off of this win. Ending a losing streak is one thing, but finding wins consistently in the NHL is a whole other ball of Jarn…krok.
