It wasn’t quite the game the Seattle Kraken wanted to close out their preseason, but it wasn’t terrible, either. Seattle had a poor start, and at one point trailed 10-1 in shots on goal. But things balanced out as the game wore on, except on the scoreboard, which eventually tipped Edmonton’s way.
Coach Dave Hakstol called it a hard game to evaluate, because for the first 10 minutes or so, the Kraken couldn’t get the puck. But then he said he liked the next 20 or 25 minutes, which makes sense because Seattle really took over for that portion, and Jared McCann even opened the scoring in the game with a banger of a shot.
Though the team was still carrying 27 players on its roster, this was the final dress rehearsal before the regular season begins Tuesday. Here are our Three Takeaways from a 3-1 preseason loss to the Oilers.
Takeaway #1 (Darren): Grubi got the game he needed
On the latest Sound Of Hockey Podcast, we said we wanted to see a full, solid performance from netminder Philipp Grubauer before real games get underway. With 22 saves on 25 shots, Friday didn’t bring the most dazzling stat line, but Grubauer looked pretty dialed in from the jump. It was a good thing, too, because it took a while for the Kraken to get their tentacles under them. Had Grubauer been off in the early going, this game would have turned sideways quickly.
The previous game Grubauer had played was also against Edmonton in Seattle on Monday. That was an awkward one for him, as he only faced 13 shots and went long stretches without facing an Oiler offering, yet he allowed three goals. He was much busier Friday, as Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Zach Hyman, and others were active early and often.
The goals Grubauer allowed Friday were all fine goals to allow. McDavid’s was an easy tap-in off a two-on-one rush that followed a defensive breakdown by the Kraken. The second was a power-play snipe off a rush by Hyman, and the third—which initially looked like one Grubauer may have wanted back—was a rocket shot that appeared to change directions off Yanni Gourde’s stick.
On the flip side, Grubauer made some excellent saves off breakaways and backdoor opportunities that gave the impression he is ready for the regular season. He has gotten out to rough starts in each of the last two seasons, but he is also coming off an outstanding playoff run. For the sake of Kraken fans, here’s hoping his postseason success carries over.
There’s room for improvement after this game, but we aren’t sounding any goaltending-related alarm bells at this time. That’s a good thing.
Takeaway #2 (John): Power play continues to impress
The Kraken power play has been an area of interest with the Sound Of Hockey team for a while, so there could be some human behavior bias here. But my eyes told me the power play looked really good. Yes, they did go zero-for-four on their manpower advantage opportunities, but there were moments against the Oilers where the Kraken maintained offensive pressure and were whipping the puck around the zone to eventually create scoring opportunities. I really liked McCann’s placement in the slot, where—if the team can get him the puck—he is automatically in a high-danger location.
Does the data reflect what my eyes have been seeing? It is not a big sample, but the Kraken were 50 percent in the face-off circle with the man advantage against Edmonton. That is 5 percentage points higher than their average last season. Excluding the Abbotsford game on Wednesday, where the data was not available, the Kraken finished the preseason at 57 percent at the face-off dot when on the power play.
Face-offs are generally not a huge statistic to focus on, but with the many struggles of the power play last season, we hypothesized that winning more face-offs on the power play would eventually lead to more possession. That, in turn, should lead to more goals. So far, so good in that area.
On the shot attempt side of the house, the Kraken had 16 shot attempts across the eight minutes of power-play time, which shook out to four shots per power play. Again, it’s a small sample size, but that is up from 3.3 shot attempts per two-minute power play from last season. That’s a big jump.
The power play is still not operating at 100 percent, because it isn’t scoring much yet, but there are some early signs this will improve from last season.
Takeaway #3 (Darren): ‘Twas an NHL lineup
With this being the finale to the meaningless portion of the season, both teams dressed similar lineups to what we will see on opening night. For Seattle, Tye Kartye was in the game on the fourth line, and Ryker Evans skated on the top pair with Adam Larsson.
The one caveat to Hakstol icing a true NHL lineup was Vince Dunn, who was held out Friday and whose status for Tuesday remains murky. He did participate in Friday’s morning skate, the first time he has practiced with the team since mysteriously going missing a week ago (he had been doing drills on his own for a few days). Will he be ready for Vegas on Tuesday?
Another question, if Dunn is ready, does that mean Kartye goes down to the AHL to start the season, or does he stay with the NHL team and push somebody else into the press box? Those questions will be answered soon.
Worth noting, Evans led all Kraken skaters with 21:13 of ice time and had some good looks offensively. Defensively, it wasn’t his best game of the preseason, as he seemed to get crossed up with partner Adam Larsson on a few occasions.
Meanwhile, it was interesting to see Kailer Yamamoto and Shane Wright scratched from the lineup in favor of Kartye. It’s no surprise at this point that Kartye appears destined for the NHL roster, but we weren’t sure which veteran he would overtake for playing time. Looks like the answer there could be Yamamoto, at least to start the season. We still think Wright is destined for big minutes in Coachella Valley to start the season, but we shall see.
Kartye played on the fourth line with Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and Brandon Tanev and also got power-play time. It’s not the ideal spot for the youngster, but the other three lines are solidified for now. We just don’t see a way to bump him up to play with more skilled players, unless somebody gets hurt or the team falters early in the season.
The Kraken have four more roster cuts to make before Tuesday’s opener.
So close, and yet so far. A good break or a shot that goes in instead of hitting the post, and we may be celebrating today, looking forward to a Western Conference Finals appearance for the Seattle Kraken in their second season. Instead, the Stars are the ones who advanced, winning Game 7 over the Kraken by the thinnest of margins, 2-1.
We were optimistic after an outstanding Game 6 for Seattle at home, which evened the series at 3-3 and pushed Dallas to the brink. But the Kraken just never seemed to reach their typical pace Monday, and their desperate push in the closing minutes was too little, too late.
“We couldn’t find our top gear,” said coach Dave Hakstol. “Give Dallas a lot of credit in that regard. I thought—to a certain degree—they answered the game that we played in Game 6. They came home into their home building and put us under pressure.”
Here are our Three Takeaways from the Kraken’s season-ending Game 7 loss to the Stars.
Takeaway #1: A bad bounce cost the Kraken
For a long time, we really liked how Game 7 was going for the Kraken. After preaching “patience” the last couple days, Seattle seemed perfectly content to weather various Dallas storms and keep the game scoreless for as long as possible.
We felt ourselves waiting for the opportunistic counterstrike to come, as it did in Game 7 of Round 1 against the Avalanche. But Seattle couldn’t seem to find it, and its two best looks—one by Jamie Oleksiak in the second period and one by Oliver Bjorkstrand in the third—both rang off the post.
“Our play with the puck wasn’t as crisp, it wasn’t as quick as it needs to be,” said Hakstol. “And that’s a combination of not getting into some spots quick enough, not moving the puck quick enough under pressure… When you’re not efficient with the puck, and you can’t get up ice, all of a sudden you’re chasing.”
Just when we started to think the Stars were getting frustrated by their inability to break through against Philipp Grubauer, a high flip into the neutral zone took a terrible bounce for Seattle. Oleksiak went back to retrieve the puck just outside the blue line, but as it dropped to the ice, it skipped backward like it had been lofted with a lob wedge. The odd check up caused Oleksiak to overskate the puck ever so slightly.
As Oleksiak reached for the skipping puck, Roope Hintz arrived at just the right moment to strip it and fly in on a breakaway, rifling a shot over Grubauer’s blocker and giving Dallas a 1-0 lead.
The Stars can seemingly only win in the playoffs if they score first, and once they get a lead going into the third, they do not lose. That icebreaking goal came at 15:59 of the second period, and once it was in, you knew a comeback was unlikely.
After Wyatt Johnston scored off an intentional icing play in the third, the game was out of reach, even if a Bjorkstrand goal with 17 seconds left gave Seattle one last glimmer of hope.
The boys were out of gas in this one.
Takeaway #2: What a game for Philipp Grubauer
The most frustrating part of this Game 7 Kraken loss to the Stars was that Philipp Grubauer—after a couple not-as-stellar games in this series—was back to the version of himself that we saw through the first round and the early stages of the second round. If the Kraken could have just limited the one-against-none opportunities, we are convinced Grubi would have gotten them through, as he was doing everything in his power to steal the game.
In all, Grubauer stopped 26 shots with 1.51 goals saved above expected, indicating that although the shot volume wasn’t remarkably high for Dallas, the shot quality was there.
You could tell from the early going that Grubauer was sharp, again being forced to stop a two-on-one rush in the first minute of the game. As the first period went on, and he kicked away all nine of Dallas’s offerings, belief started to grow that even a goal or two for the Kraken would be enough in this game.
Those goals never came, though, and Seattle squandered an outstanding performance by their netminder.
“That’s my job,” said Grubauer. “If there’s a breakdown, you’ve got to make a stop for the guys. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make the stop on the second goal, but we battled back and we got a goal there, and unfortunately we ran out of time.”
Grubauer has had a lot of lows in his two seasons with the Kraken so far, but seeing what he did in these playoffs, when he started all 14 games, gave Kraken fans hope that he can be the guy they thought they were getting before the inaugural season.
Now we know what he can do when the lights are shining their brightest, but can he carry it through a full season in 2023-24?
Takeaway #3: What a run for the Seattle Kraken
For this last Takeaway of the season, we just want to say what a magical run this has been and how much we appreciate you following along and supporting Sound Of Hockey.
“I’m super proud, honestly,” said Yanni Gourde. “We battled super hard all year long, and we built something here this year.”
Yeah, we feel the same, Yanni.
As many of you know, it was a very difficult season for us, as we lost one of our founding members and a pillar of the Seattle hockey community in Andy Eide. We know he would have loved every minute of the playoffs, and seeing the Seattle Thunderbirds (Andy’s true love) simultaneously playing in the WHL Championship Series would have brought him so much joy. We’ve been thinking of our pal through every step of this journey.
As for the playoffs themselves, of course a trip to the Western Conference Finals would have made this run even better, but up through Game 6 of the second round, you couldn’t have scripted it any better for Seattle. We’re hopeful this run has ignited a new level of attachment for fans, both new and old, to the franchise and the sport itself.
“We took a big leap this year,” said Jordan Eberle. “I don’t think anyone expected us to make the playoffs, didn’t expect us to beat Colorado, and I’m sure no one had us to get to [Game] 7 here. So, I think as a group, obviously this is the first time we’ve been through this. You’ve got to learn how to lose first, and then find a way to win.”
The Kraken did the unthinkable by knocking off the defending Stanley Cup champion Avalanche in Round 1, then pushed the Dallas Stars to a deciding Game 7 in Round 2 and came up one goal short. Along the way, they created core memories for folks watching, and as Hakstol said Monday, “This group changed the landscape of hockey in Seattle.”
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.
Saturday’s Game 6 between the Kraken and Stars was another “pinch me” moment in a series of too-good-to-be-true experiences for Seattle’s budding fanbase. With the Kraken pushed to the brink of elimination, they shoved their way off the ledge with a high-flying (though sometimes imperfect) 6-3 win to force another Game 7.
“I love the way our team handled today,” said coach Dave Hakstol. “We knew what was on the line… We as a staff didn’t have to say a whole lot.”
Climate Pledge Arena was rocking all afternoon, and the 17,151 screaming fans went home happy, as their beloved team lived to fight another day.
Here are our Three Takeaways from another unforgettable Kraken playoff win.
Takeaway #1: The kids are alright
A trio of young heroes—all still unable to rent a car because of their age—emerged to help the Kraken win Game 6. Rookies Tye Kartye and Matty Beniers each scored, and 24-year-old waiver claim Eeli Tolvanen had three points to lead the way for Seattle.
These guys have been such interesting stories. The undrafted Kartye was playing junior hockey last season, signed a free-agent contract with the Kraken in the offseason, and surprised everyone by becoming the AHL Rookie of the Year in Coachella Valley. He only got called up after Jared McCann got hurt in Round 1, and he has done so well on the line with Beniers and Jordan Eberle that even Saturday, when Hakstol shuffled McCann back into the top six, Kartye kept his spot on the top line.
Kartye’s goal demonstrated one of the 22-year-old forward’s best assets, a hard and deceptive shot that he can get off even when he doesn’t seem to be in a great shooting posture. Off a three-on-two rush with Eberle and Beniers, Kartye elected to pull the puck into his feet and shoot, surprising Jake Oettinger and putting him on the bench after the Stars netminder had allowed his fourth goal.
KARTYE PARTYE!!! 🚨 🎉
The legend of Tye grows! Off a rush, Kartye takes a pass from Beniers and snipes it past Oettinger.
“That goal from Karts, looking off Ebs on the other side, I love it,” said Yanni Gourde, who had a big day himself. And that’s not the first time in these playoffs Kartye has done that exact same thing to score a goal.
Meanwhile, Beniers, the No. 2 overall pick in last season’s draft, is the favorite to win the Calder Trophy as a 20-year-old. He helped create his fellow rookie’s goal by passing it off to him and then driving hard to the net. He also scored a beauty in the third period that should have been the dagger, if it weren’t for Seattle’s propensity for allowing response goals.
Moments after the Kraken had completed a crucial penalty kill, Carson Soucy painfully blocked a Ty Dellandrea shot, and the puck caromed to Jaden Schwartz. Schwartz sprung Eberle and Beniers on a two-on-one the other way. Eberle made a perfect pass to Beniers, and Beniers showed his finishing ability, making it 5-2. The two rookies now have three goals each in the playoffs.
Here’s the Beniers goal. Came off a 2-on-1 with Eberle.
Tolvanen, meanwhile, has remained one of the most fascinating storylines since he arrived in Seattle. Placed on waivers by the Predators in December, then scratched for his first two weeks as a Kraken, he finally played his first game with the club on Jan. 1. He hasn’t left the lineup since and has become a staple on the line with Gourde and Oliver Bjorkstrand.
Tolvanen finished a beautiful passing play to make it 3-1 in the second period, after Gourde buttonhooked and found a trailing Bjorkstrand. Bjorkstrand then served it up to Tolvanen, who rifled it into a yawning cage from a bad angle.
Let’s not forget Tolvanen also created Gourde’s opening goal by dropping the puck back and hustling to the crease and also Eberle’s power-play goal with a blast off the far pad.
What has Hakstol’s messaging to that trio of youngsters been? “Keep playing, fellas. Just keep playing,” Hakstol said. “They’re playing their tails off, they’re playing with a lot of confidence.”
Takeaway #2: The power play looked awesome in Game 6
While the depth of the Kraken has been their biggest strength all season, another key to their success has been their ability to adjust and improve in areas of weakness. The power play has not been good in this postseason, clicking at just 14.7 percent and contributing just five total goals, including Eberle’s tally Saturday.
This was an area of noticeable improvement in Game 6, though. We thought the power play units showed glimpses of improvement in Game 5, but they took a big step Saturday and were downright dynamic, even when they didn’t score.
“We were pretty simple,” said Hakstol. “We won face-offs… Let’s just start with puck battles, and that’s a puck battle, right? So, you start with the puck. We were looking not just to get set up and stay on the outside, we were looking to get into an attack mode with that mentality, but the first power play really set the tone for us.”
They did keep it simple and seemed to be focused on getting shots through to the Dallas net, but they also had more player movement in the zone than we’ve seen all postseason, and McCann looked like his old self, rifling dangerous shots from the top of the left circle.
“Honestly, we needed that, and our guys went out there and they did the job,” said Gourde. “They were amazing. They shot the puck and that’s what you need to break things down a little bit, shot volume, and then eventually you find your place inside and Ebs was able to find the back of the net there.”
EBER-LEAD! 🚨
Awesome power play movement, and Jordan Eberle with a little backhand chip shot to finish a Tolvanen rebound.
Another thing that stood out was the way Seattle carried the puck through the neutral zone to create clean zone entries. They have always used the “slingshot” play, where one guy starts up ice, and as soon as he meets pressure, he does a deep drop pass for the next guy. We didn’t see the drop passes Saturday, as Kraken players instead just took whatever lane was given to them and sliced their way through the Stars’ neutral zone forecheck.
It was an interesting little tweak that seemed to work wonders. The funny thing about it is it’s a change to how they did things even in the game before, yet Seattle didn’t practice—not even a morning skate—between the two games. So, they successfully changed a tactic without ever trying it out on the ice.
Takeaway #3: Overcoming letdowns
Game 6 was a thrilling contest and an impressive performance by the Kraken, who knew coming in their backs were against the wall. They came out flying in the first period and rode another second-period outburst to a 6-3 win that staved off elimination.
But it was far from perfect for Seattle, which gave up response goals on THREE separate occasions in this game. Mason Marchment scored 31 seconds after Gourde’s icebreaker, Joe Pavelski scored on the power play 1:14 after Kartye made it 4-1, and Joel Kiviranta got Dallas back within two just 15 seconds after Beniers thought he had the dagger.
Plus, the opening of the third period was downright sloppy. Considering the situation, the Kraken were way too stretched out to open the final frame, and the Stars got some golden opportunities as a result. Just 30 seconds in, Pavelski and Miro Heiskanen had a two-on-one opportunity. Pavelski hit the post, the puck skittered to Heiskanen and hit off him, then slid behind Grubauer and out the other side. Two minutes after that, Jason Robertson also hit the post off a rush.
It was almost as if the Kraken were so hellbent on not sitting back in the third period that they overcorrected toward playing on their toes and almost threw the game away.
To their credit, they used the lucky breaks to right the ship and ended up with a convincing victory.
“[We took] a breather,” said Gourde. “I think we had a whistle in the D-zone, there was a face-off, and we needed one shift in the O-zone. We went down there, took a shot, and then from there, we were like, ‘Ok, let’s reset.'”
After that game, the fans may need a breather too, but there’s no time! Bullets dodged, Game 6 won. Let’s go play another Game 7 on Monday, shall we?
This second-round series between the Kraken and the Stars has taken a turn in Dallas’s favor. After Seattle had a chance to grab a 3-1 lead in a pivotal Game 4, the team now faces elimination, trailing 3-2 after a Game 5 loss at American Airlines Center on Thursday.
The Kraken spotted the Stars another big lead in this one, 3-0, before turning on the jets and nearly completing the comeback. Instead, Dallas bent but didn’t break and skated away with a 5-2 win and its first lead of the series.
Here are our Three Takeaways from a tough Kraken loss to the Stars in Game 5.
Takeaway #1: Kraken spotted Dallas a three-goal lead
The first period was hard to reconcile. The Kraken had a pretty hot start and played the first two shifts almost entirely in Dallas’s end. Heck, they managed the puck well for the majority of the period and went to the room after 20 minutes with a 14-5 shots-on-goal advantage.
But they didn’t generate anything inside on Jake Oettinger, and two early breakdowns in a span of just 1:38 both ended up in the back of Seattle’s net. Add Joe Pavelski getting his seventh goal of the series off his own rebound 35 seconds into the second period, and the mountain got too steep for the Kraken to climb.
“The first one is just a quick play that we kind of stab at, instead of being able to kind of take command of the puck and make a play on that,” said coach Dave Hakstol. “That’s the first pass-out goal, and then the second one is off of transition, quick.”
Wyatt Johnston’s opening goal had a dash of bad luck involved for Seattle. Alex Wennberg blocked a shot, but it rimmed around the boards and went right to Jani Hakanpää. A moment later, Will Borgen broke up a pass, but his deflection went right back to Jamie Benn below the goal line (that’s the “stab” Hakstol was referencing). Benn was able to get the second pass attempt through to Johnston, and—although Borgen came close to both breaking up the pass again and blocking the shot with his leg—Johnston got a quick shot off and beat Philipp Grubauer over the glove.
Stars strike first. #SeaKraken had a good start going but left Wyatt Johnston alone in front.
The second goal was off a rush, and though the Kraken had players back, Roope Hintz used Borgen as a screen and wired a wicked wrister off the post and in.
“You want to play aggressive, you want to play on your toes, you want to skate, and so that’s kind of the way that we’d like to play,” said Jordan Eberle. “We want to be quick team, but we have to be smart about it too. We can’t be diving in everywhere and giving them odd-man rushes and opportunities to score.”
Uh oh. Now Hintz scores off a rush, and it’s 2-0 Stars very early in the game. pic.twitter.com/w544aE8tQS
Perhaps because the three-goal deficit was built up by such an early point in the second period, the game didn’t feel out of reach for the Kraken until Hintz scored his second of the game to make it 4-2 in the third period. Still, you’re not going to win many games you trail by three goals at any point, and the Kraken have now done that in each of the last two games. Unsurprisingly, the results have been losses in each.
Takeaway #2: The comeback came up short
It’s been said thousands of times now, but the Seattle Kraken never quit.
Down 3-0 in the second period, they finally generated their first good chance inside and answered the Pavelski goal. Matty Beniers made a tape-to-tape pass through the neutral zone to Tye Kartye, who dished to Jordan Eberle and went right to the net to take Thomas Harley out of the play. Eberle then showed his elite passing prowess and threaded the needle to Adam Larsson, who scored his second goal in as many games.
THE BIG CAT ANSWERS! 🐱 🚨
Eberle threads the needle, and on their first chance inside all game the #SeaKraken get on the board.
It appeared Larsson had another one five minutes later, as he was (for some reason) the one creating havoc in front of Oettinger when Jared McCann fired from the top of the right circle. It first looked like Larsson had gotten his stick on the puck to redirect it in, but replay showed it had actually deflected off Joel Hanley’s foot.
With the goal credited to McCann, that made him the 18th unique goal scorer for the Kraken in these playoffs, leaving Ryan Donato as the only player in the Game 5 lineup (aside from Grubauer) to have not registered a goal.
Momentum is a real thing, and sometimes in hockey you can sense goals coming. Once Seattle got it back to 3-2, it*really* felt like an equalizer was on the way for several minutes of the second period, and then again once the Kraken finished killing off a Jamie Oleksiak penalty to start the third.
“We had a push,” said Eberle. “You could feel it on the bench, [we were] like, ‘Keep going,’ you could feel it coming. But obviously that fourth one is a bit of a dagger.”
Sadly for the Kraken, like in the first period, although they outshot the Stars 10-4, they had a hard time getting pucks inside. At the other end, one doozy of an opportunity for Roope Hintz was all Dallas needed to put the game away.
“We’re always confident that we’re going to be able to go out there and get that goal, no question,” said Hakstol. “We didn’t sustain quite enough in the third period.”
Takeaway #3: Is Philipp Grubauer cooling off?
Grubauer has been Seattle’s best player in these playoffs, without a doubt. He was also hung out to dry on two of the goals he allowed in Game 5. The thing is, though, he’s been “hung out to dry” plenty of times in these playoffs and has routinely come up huge, bailing out his mates on countless golden opportunities for Colorado and Dallas.
He didn’t bail the Kraken out as much in the last two outings, though, and allowed nine goals in those two games. We still wouldn’t say he’s playing badly—he kept the Kraken in Game 4 through about half the game, and he got better as Game 5 went on—but he also is not on fire the way he was through Round 1 and in the early stages of Round 2.
“I think Grubi, he was battling it a little bit early to find the puck,” said Hakstol. “Even on that second one, that’s one where if we get that save, it helps just settle us down a little bit and keep us in a little bit better spot.”
At this point, there’s no changing goalies for Game 6; Grubauer is the guy. But, the success of the team in this postseason has largely hinged on the German Gentleman’s ability to make the saves he isn’t supposed to make, so he will surely need some of those if the Kraken are going to survive Saturday’s elimination game.
Bonus Takeaway: The Kraken are on the brink
In line with the “Kraken never quit” theme, they now face up to two games in which a loss means their season is over. Oddly, as these playoffs have gone on, every time Seattle has had the upper hand in a series, they’ve crumpled. For example, they won Game 1 in Colorado and Dallas, then lost Game 2 in both series. Similarly, with a chance to take a commanding 3-1 lead in Game 4, they gave up four goals in the second period and allowed Dallas to level the series.
They haven’t played the last two games with enough desperation, so now—with their backs against the wall—they should certainly have that in Game 6. Will it be enough to force another Game 7?
Larsson thinks so. “I’m confident we can come back in this series,” he said. “It’s far from over.”
Eberle also seems excited about it. “It’s do or die next game. This is when it gets exciting; these are the games you want to play in.”
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.
Tuesday’s Game 4 between the Kraken and the Stars at Climate Pledge Arena was pivotal in this second-round Stanley Cup Playoff series. Had Seattle pulled out a win, it would have been in complete control with a 3-1 lead and Dallas pushed to the brink. Instead, the Stars showed they knew the stakes and played with more desperation, flipping the script from the previous game and cruising to a 6-3 win.
As is tradition for the Kraken, they did make a game of it in the third period. It was too little, too late, but if a controversial goal by Max Domi in the second had been called the other way, Seattle may have been able to level the score.
Here are our Three Takeaways from a 6-3 Game 4 Kraken loss to the Stars.
Takeaway #1: “Guaranteed goalie interference”
You could sense the game heading in the wrong direction after Thomas Harley scored at 4:46 of the second period to make it 2-0. Philipp Grubauer had made some nice saves in the first, but even with a two-goal lead, Dallas was continuing to press. It felt like a sideways turn was coming at any moment.
That moment was the 9:25 mark of the period, when Max Domi beat Grubauer over the shoulder from an angle. Even to the naked eye, the goal looked odd, though, and Grubauer immediately protested that he had been bumped by Jamie Benn.
Replay showed that Benn actually gave Grubauer a shove at the top of the blue paint, which moved Grubauer out of the goalcrease. When Grubauer tried to get back, Benn ran into him again, just as the shot was coming, though that contact was outside the paint and happened because Benn was pushed by Carson Soucy.
Rightfully, coach Dave Hakstol challenged, but after a long review, the officials determined it to be a good goal. By rule, the failed challenge meant Seattle was assessed a delay-of-game penalty, during which Joe Pavelski scored his sixth goal of the series and made it 4-0.
We asked Jared McCann—playing his first game since suffering a suspected concussion in the previous series—what he saw on the play, and McCann did not mince words. “I have no idea what the hell goalie interference is anymore,” McCann said. “I really don’t; I don’t think anybody does in this league. We thought it was like guaranteed goalie interference. So, obviously, he made contact with Grubi, and then the puck went in. It was pretty obvious, but I don’t know what else to say.”
Jared McCann: “I have no idea what the hell goalie interference is anymore. I really don’t.”
Hakstol was equally perturbed and somewhat comically said he didn’t want to get into the specifics of why he challenged the call… before then very much getting into the specifics of why he challenged the call. “I just felt like Grubi got blown out of the crease,” Hakstol said. “And regardless of the amount of time in between, to be able to reset was impossible.”
That’s what we saw too. We understand the rule as it is written and that contact has to happen inside the crease for the call to go the goalie’s way. We also understand that there’s some subjective period of time given, in which the goalie is expected to reset and get back in position.
What we *think* happened from the officials’ point of view (Hakstol was not given an explanation, so we’re just hypothesizing) is they viewed the two points of contact as two separate plays and that Grubauer reset between the two.
If the second contact was the only contact that had happened, then we could get how that call would have gone Dallas’s way. But we don’t get how you can look at the second contact separately from the first contact, when Grubauer never would have been in that position, well outside the crease, if Benn hadn’t pushed him out there in the first place.
Recognizing it’s hard to look at plays like this with a level head, we also asked Stars coach Pete DeBoer what he saw. “It looked to me like there was a little bit of a bump,” DeBoer said. “I thought he reset, and then I thought, from my perspective, I thought he— there was a second bump, but [Benn] got pushed in on the second one, and it was outside the paint. So, I thought it was the right call.”
It’s the duality of sports. One team is furious with the decision, the other thinks it was the right call.
It has to go one way or the other; sometimes it goes in your favor, sometimes it doesn’t. What we really dislike about the goalie interference challenge, though—and this is a great example—is that there is gray area sometimes where it’s hard to make the call. The officials proved this was a hard decision when they hovered over their tablets in the penalty box for several minutes before finally emerging and announcing “good goal.”
So why should a team be penalized for challenging in that scenario? The Kraken very well could have (and should have?) won the challenge in this case, yet they still have to send a guy to the box because the referees interpreted the play differently. It turns it into a two-goal swing, and if you eliminate the empty-net goal at the end of the game, this is a two-goal contest.
It’s all very silly.
Takeaway #2: Jared McCann back in action
One big positive in this game was the return of Jared McCann, who hadn’t played since getting knocked out of Game 4 by Cale Makar in the first round. In the early going, things looked a bit sloppy for McCann, who played initially on the fourth line with Ryan Donato and Brandon Tanev. He did have a good look off a one-timer from the top of the slot, but you could tell he wasn’t at peak performance in terms of how he was handling the puck.
As the game went on, he seemed to settle in and was shuffled around the lineup to play a few shifts with his usual linemates, Jordan Eberle and Matty Beniers.
“First couple shifts, it was a little tougher,” said McCann. “But towards the end there I felt really good.”
Hakstol hadn’t yet talked to McCann after the game, but said he was curious to get the star forward’s take on how he felt. “From my vantage point, I thought things slowed down a little bit for him as the game went on,” said Hakstol. “And that’s what you would hope for and expect.”
With Daniel Sprong now out with an injury, McCann’s return came at just the right time. He finished the night with three shots on goal and 13:11 of ice time.
Takeaway #3: Not good enough
As much as we want to hang this one on the controversial goalie interference ruling, the Kraken were not good enough in the first 40 minutes to win a playoff game against a good team. In fact, those were Hakstol’s exact words when he was asked about the team putting just 10 shots on Jake Oettinger in the first two periods. “Not good enough,” Hakstol said.
The play that really sticks out to encapsulate how Seattle performed is the opening goal by Benn, which came on a power play late in the first period. Seattle had its first manpower advantage of the game in progress but allowed Radek Faksa to drive all the way in on Grubauer for a dangerous shorthanded scoring chance. Vince Dunn had no choice but to saw Faksa’s stick in half, washing out the power play after one minute.
As Esa Lindell was getting freed from the box, putting Dallas onto the power play, Seattle had the puck in the offensive zone. For some reason, Jamie Oleksiak just softly poked it around the end wall, effectively handing over possession for no apparent reason. Four passes later between Roope Hintz, Miro Heiskanen, and Benn, and suddenly the Stars were up 1-0.
“We had possession of the puck, as [their penalty] came to a close, with the right guys out there,” said Hakstol. “But we gave them the puck, and they started with it. And obviously, coming into the zone, we just didn’t defend it the right way coming in.”
It was a head scratcher of a play, and one of two gaffes by Oleksiak in the game; he also had an egregious turnover to Hintz for Dallas’s fifth goal.
That’s probably a backbreaker. Bad turnover by Oleksiak to Hintz, and Hintz cleans up a rebound.
Of course, it wasn’t just Oleksiak in this game, and he has been one of Seattle’s most important players in this playoff run, so we’re not trying to pick on him. But, it was plays like those two—where the Kraken just didn’t seem to be going the extra mile like they typically have in the postseason—that pushed the Kraken into a 5-1 hole to start the third period.
Again, to Seattle’s credit, the group battled back and almost got back in the game, hopefully setting a positive tone for Game 5 on Thursday.
“Every period matters,” said Hakstol. “Seven game series, this is Game No. 4, 2-2 right now, and every shift, every play, every period matters.”
It’s a whole new best-of-three series now.
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.
The magical playoff ride continued Tuesday. The Seattle Kraken picked up right where they left off after their first-round win over Colorado and beat the Dallas Stars in their building to take a 1-0 series lead.
Game 1 wasn’t devoid of drama, as Seattle had to overcome one of the most epic individual playoff performances we’ve seen, yet somehow, they skated away with a massive 5-4 overtime win.
“That’s how you want to start the series,” said overtime hero, Yanni Gourde. “It’s going to be a tough series. We know how good and strong they are… It’s a huge game, first one.”
Here are our Three Takeaways from another heart-pounding Kraken win, this time over the Stars.
Takeaway #1: A bonkers first period
It was a tad concerning to see the Kraken concede the first goal of the game for the first time all playoffs, when Joe Pavelski rifled a perfect shot past Philipp Grubauer at 2:25 of the first period. Nerves across Seattle were temporarily settled nine minutes later, when Esa Lindell coughed the puck up to Jordan Eberle, who tapped it to Morgan Geekie, who tapped it to Jaden Schwartz, who shuffled it between the pads of Jake Oettinger.
Ok, 1-1 game, everything will calm down from here on, right? WRONG!
Pavelski added his second of the game off a high tip (he is truly the best in the league at tipping pucks) to make it 2-1, then Justin Schultz, Oliver Bjorkstrand, and Eberle all scored within a 53-second span to give Seattle a 4-2 lead before the end of the first period.
We won’t painstakingly walk through every goal the Kraken scored in that chaotic frame, but we will say our favorite of the lot was the Schultz goal. That’s because it was the product of good, hard work by the fourth line, with Brandon Tanev winning a board battle against two Dallas players, then Ryan Donato making a perfect pass to Schultz, who had a nice finish.
#SeaKraken second goal comes off a beautiful pass by Ryan Donato after he supports the puck battle low in the zone.
“We had a pretty good first period,” said Schwartz. “Obviously, they were pretty opportunistic there, but we did a good job of staying with it, coming out, being aggressive… A bit of a wild first period, but I thought we were on our toes, and we were aggressive.”
It was an impressive onslaught by the Kraken, who hung four goals on Oettinger in 15 minutes. That was—as Mike Kelly from NHL Network pointed out—as many goals as Minnesota scored in the last three games of their first-round series against Dallas.
The vibes were good after the first.
Takeaway #2: The Joe Pavelski Show is ruined by Seattle
Pavelski’s two goals in the first were only the opening act of his smash hit spectacular. Coming back from a scary injury after a high hit by Matt Dumba in Game 1 of Dallas versus Minnesota, any production from the 38-year-old Pavelski on this night would have drawn critical acclaim. But Pavelski had a performance for the ages, only to have it ruined by a Seattle win in overtime.
“Joe Pavelski, what a performance,” said coach Dave Hakstol. “I think he’s played close to 1300 NHL regular-season games, and I don’t know how many playoff games. But he showed what kind of a competitor he is tonight. Obviously he gave us a lot of trouble.”
After a much tighter-checking second period, Seattle had a chance to put the game away in the third, when Eberle stole a puck deep in the offensive zone and handed it off to Matty Beniers for what looked like a sure goal. But with a mostly open net, Beniers rang it hard off the post, which kept the lead at 4-2.
— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights (@HockeyDaily365) May 3, 2023
A few minutes later, after Dallas had killed Mason Marchment’s undisciplined minor penalty on Geekie that absolutely should have been four minutes, the second act of the Pavelski Show began.
Jamie Benn took a shot that hit Philipp Grubauer right in the chest. The sure-handed playoff version of Grubauer looked like he was ready to clamp that puck down for a whistle, but it popped out for Pavelski to bang home his easiest goal of the night, and that brought out the hats.
Joe Pavelski drives to the net and cleans up Benn's rebound to finish off the HAT TRICK, Stars within 1!
— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights (@HockeyDaily365) May 3, 2023
The Pavelski Show finally reached its climax at 13:23 of the third when he batted a puck out of the air to beat Grubauer for the fourth time on the night.
“Pavelski had a good night,” said Schwartz. “[He had] a couple good redirections, and that’s where he scores a lot of his goals, so we’ve got to be aware of that and take his stick away a little bit better.”
Takeaway #3: The Kraken are a resilient bunch
We didn’t know how the Kraken would act in this contest, just one day removed from a highly emotional Game 7 victory in Denver. We also didn’t know how they would respond after getting scored on first, something that didn’t happen in any of the previous seven playoff games. We also didn’t know how the Kraken would handle it if a player on the other team scored four goals against them, while simultaneously erasing a two-goal lead in the third period.
What did the Kraken do each time they got punched? They just got right back up and punched back, of course.
“Obviously, you don’t want to give up two goals, [when you] go into the third leading by two,” said Gourde. “That’s something we can clean up. But I love the response, I loved our composure, I loved the poise. We’re a pretty mature group, and we trusted that the process was going to get it done.”
A prime example of the team’s resiliency was Grubauer, who has been unflappable in this postseason. He juggled a puck that led to Pavelski’s third goal, but he bounced back for overtime and made two massive saves in a row on Roope Hintz and Ty Dellandrea to prolong the game just enough.
It was just moments after that pair of saves that the Kraken got set up in the Stars zone and created havoc. Bjorkstrand took a shot that hit Oettinger and pinballed around to his left. Three Dallas players had a crack at clearing it, but Yanni Gourde just kept whacking away and somehow kept the broken play alive. Finally, the puck sat up on its side for Gourde to take a swing at it, and it launched up and over Oettinger’s shoulder to give the Kraken a 5-4 win.
That game was surely not how Hakstol drew it up, but for Seattle to go into a new building in a new series and get this thing off on the right foot shows—yet again—the incredible character of this group.
What a win.
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.
