The Seattle Kraken played their 45th game of the season Thursday against the streaking New Jersey Devils, one of the best teams in the Eastern Conference. When Andre Burakovsky circled around the offensive zone in overtime and loaded up a shot that squeezed through the pads of Mackenzie Blackwood, the Kraken officially took over first place in the Pacific Division from the Vegas Golden Knights.
So, did you expect the Kraken to be in first place 45 games into the season? Yeah, neither did we.
“I don’t know where we were at this point last year points-wise, but it goes to show that we took a big step as a team and as an organization,” said Ryan Donato, who was one of the heroes for Seattle.
This feels like one of those inflection points in the season, as the Kraken cleared a huge hurdle Thursday and now will try to put some distance between themselves and the rest of the division.
Here are our Three Takeaways from a thrilling and memorable 4-3 Kraken overtime win against the Devils.
Takeaway #1: Kraken bent but didn’t break
After a hellaciously long stretch of road games (with one midday home game against the Tampa Bay Lightning mixed in Monday), Seattle came out Thursday looking rejuvenated. For a good stretch of the first period, it felt like the Kraken were doing whatever they wanted with the puck and were setting themselves up for grade-A chance after grade-A chance.
“We played quick again tonight,” coach Dave Hakstol said. “We had our energy back, physically and mentally we were on it, and you could feel that right from the start of the hockey game. And that carried through, I mean there’s gonna be momentum swings back and forth, but you could feel that throughout the hockey game.”
Blackwood stood mostly tall in the opening 20 minutes, kicking out 14 of the 15 shots he faced in the frame, but Ryan Donato broke through for his first of two goals on the night at 12:27.
RYAN GOAL-NATO! 🚨
He gets the #SeaKraken on the board first with a short-side snipe! 🎯
Midway through the second, Jordan Eberle had a chance to make it a 3-0 game and put the Kraken on cruise control, but after deking Blackwood out of his jock, Eberle backhanded a shot off the post. Seconds later, Dawson Mercer got the Devils on the board at the other end, and suddenly New Jersey had life.
Sure enough, some hairy moments ensued down the stretch. With the Kraken on their only power play of the game, Mercer chipped a puck past Vince Dunn and found Erik Haula, who had gotten behind Seattle’s defense. Haula flew in and beat Martin Jones to tie the game at 6:04 of the third period.
The Kraken pushed right back with a Brandon Tanev goal at 7:51, set up beautifully by Yanni Gourde and Donato. But the comeback kids from New Jersey had a relentless push with their goalie pulled in the final two minutes of regulation, and Nico Hischier banged in another tying goal with just 1:14 left to play.
Still, the Kraken didn’t let it take the wind out of their sails, and they instead went right back to work in overtime, finishing the job with Burakovsky’s ripper through the wickets.
Hakstol said it was resilience that got his team through to the two enormous standings points. “We played a really good first period. Back and forth game from there, and just to be able to push back after the shorty, that can be a dagger at times to give up a goal like that at that time of the game.”
Takeaway #2: The Cale Fleury/Ryan Donato night
One thing that’s been remarkable about this team all season has been the way different guys have stepped up almost every night. Thursday, Donato, playing up the lineup to replace injured Jaden Schwartz, had the first two goals of the game and also the primary assist on Tanev’s third-period tap-in goal.
“To be honest, the first one, it was lucky that Wenny let the puck go, because that would have been offside by about four feet if he got the puck,” joked Donato. “At that point, I’m in a spot where there’s not much angle for me to shoot. I’m just trying to get it to the net as quickly as I can, and that one was pretty lucky.”
Donato added that on his second goal, which was also a short-side snipe, he was planning to pass but was forced to shoot by New Jersey’s backcheck. He got the shot away quickly, and again beat Blackwood.
IT’S A DONNY DOUBLE-UP! 🎯 🎯
Donato’s second of the game. Both have been short-side snipes over the glove.
“Those two goals, that’s the story of our year, right?” Hakstol said. “It’s the story of our team, somebody stepping up and scoring big goals at the right time. We had had a ton of good opportunities at that point in time [in the first period], both in tight and some different looks, so that first goal was a real big goal in the hockey game to be able to break through. And it was a hell of a shot.”
Meanwhile, on the back end, Cale Fleury slid in to replace injured Justin Schultz, playing his first game in more than a month. Fleury looked calm and confident all night and got rewarded with his first ever NHL assist. That was his first NHL point since the 2019-20 season when he scored one goal with the Montreal Canadiens. Ironically, both his goal in his first season and his assist Thursday came against the Devils.
“I knew it was both against these guys,” Fleury said with a smile. “So I guess they’re my favorite team to play against.”
Fleury’s night was downright heartwarming. This is a guy that has had a tough go with the Kraken this season, getting scratched in 38 out the team’s 45 games. We’ve seen him bag skating and working on his own skills at almost every morning skate and practice, only to show up and watch the games in street clothes.
But after he played a solid game on the blue line and even pitched in offensively against the Devils, Fleury was all smiles.
“It’s pretty tough, obviously, being in the situation I have been,” Fleury said. “But it’s something that kind of just stays in the back of your head every day when you’re doing the skates that I’ve been doing, so I think it’s kind of easy for me to stay into it.”
Hakstol liked what he saw from Fleury as well.
“It’s four or five weeks [since his last game], it’s a long time,” Hakstol said. “But he came in tonight, and it was pretty seamless. He did a good job. He looked confident right away, and you can see that when a guy’s moving and he’s gapped up and he’s physical and he’s confident with the puck coming out of the zone.”
As the Kraken finally begin to sustain injuries after a very healthy first three months, they will need their depth players to step up even more than they have before. Thursday’s performances by guys like Donato and Fleury brought hope that this team can withstand absences from key players.
Takeaway #3: The Kraken are in first place
Just as we all predicted would happen back in September, the Seattle Kraken officially took over first place from the Golden Knights Thursday, as Vegas lost 3-2 to the Detroit Red Wings.
It’s mind boggling to think where this team was last season and how far it has come to develop a winning culture and a belief that they can beat any team in the NHL.
“It tells me the work that the group in here has done,” Hakstol said. “That’s the bottom line. That’s what we’re here for; you’re here to compete for a playoff spot and positioning, and No. 1 on the list, competing every night for points that go into the bank towards a playoff berth.”
Now, the big question is whether Seattle can fend off teams like Vegas, Los Angeles, Edmonton, and Calgary the rest of the way and remain at the top when it’s all said and done.
“We’re playing against good teams and every point matters now,” said Donato. “I think we climbed to the top of the standings in our division with that game, but you know, there’s going to be a lot of teams trying to knock us off the top.”
The Seattle Kraken have been rolling once again, with a six-game win streak and five straight victories on their current very long road trip. The Sound Of Hockey Podcast is here to break down their latest games and call out some of the most impressive individual performances from this stretch.
Aside from discussing the games, John, Andy, and Darren talk about other Kraken news like Matty Beniers being selected for the All-Star Game and also losing a bet with Jordan Eberle.
The guys then shift to Down on the Farm to discuss Shane Wright going back to the OHL, plus lots of crazy trades for the local WHL teams.
Next, the show moves into segments, which this week include:
They had to grind it out, but the Kraken found a way to their sixth straight win thanks to a two-goal third period and a strong Philipp Grubauer performance in a 4-3 victory against the Buffalo Sabres at Key Bank Center Tuesday.
Grubauer kept the Kraken within striking distance by making 32 saves in his first start since Dec. 30.
“I wouldn’t say it was our best,” forward Jordan Eberle said. “Give them credit, they played well and created a lot. Grubi was excellent tonight, he made some big saves and kept us ahead.”
Seattle twice erased a one-goal deficit and started the third period tied at 2-2. That’s when Matty Beniers made his presence known. He gave the Kraken their first lead, 3-2 when he crashed the net and scored on a rebound at 1:06 of the third period.
“The goal he scored at the start of the third period is indicative of how he plays,” Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said of Beniers. “He finds a way inside, he’s moved to a different spot on the power play, and he’s been able to find a few inside there.”
Four minutes later, at 5:17, he spotted defenseman Justin Schultz pinching in from the point and put the puck right on his stick from behind the net. Schultz scored, and Seattle took a 4-2 lead.
“Those are timely goals,” Eberle said. “Those are goals that when you get into playoff times and you get those momentum swings if you can score like that at key times, those are huge.”
Alex Tuch notched a six-on-five goal at 19:38 to cut the lead to 4-3, but the Kraken survived the final 20 seconds to pick up win No. 5 to open their seven-game road trip and a win on the second night of a back-to-back.
“We just keep working, that’s all,” Hakstol said. “We’re not quite halfway through the year, these guys work hard together, they care about having success together. Games like this when it’s a back-to-back where it doesn’t look that pretty, it doesn’t look that good but that’s a great win.”
Beniers, Eberle, and Schultz each had a goal and assist for the Kraken (24-12-4), while Andre Burakovsky had two assists. Seattle goes for seven straight in a big game Thursday when they travel to the Boston Bruins.
Tuch scored twice for the Sabres (20-17-2), who had won six of eight. Former Tri-City American Eric Comrie made 18 saves.
The Sabres went up 1-0 at 9:56 of the first when Tuch converted on a pass from Tage Thompson.
Seattle would respond and tie the game 1-1 on a power-play goal from Eberle at 18:52. Parked in the slot, Eberle would deflect a shot from Burakovsky past Comrie.
“That goal gave us some life to get us back to even. That’s one of the key moments to the game,” Hakstol said.
In the second period, it would be Buffalo who struck first again on a goal from Rasmus Dahlin at 5:12 of the second period. He found a shooting lane while on the power play and let a wrist shot go to make it 2-1 Sabres.
Schultz would then send a perfect pass to the goal mouth where Yanni Gourde tipped it in at 8:59 to get the game square at 2-2.
“The other key turning point in the game is Gourdie’s goal,” Hakstol said. “That’s a heck of a play by Schultzie and he finds a way to get one that turns out to be the game-winner as well.”
Rebound game for Grubauer
Grubauer had been off for five games but showed no rust Tuesday while making several key saves.
“It’s been almost two weeks, but it felt pretty good,” Grubauer said. “The first period was a little rusty, but after that I found my game. From then on it was good.”
His best work came in the third period with the Kraken holding on to the lead. Trying desperately to score and tie the game, the Sabres threw everything at the net and pushed. Grubauer made 17 saves in the third period and only allowed the six-on-five goal.
It would be enough to steer Seattle to a win down the stretch and a good sign if both Grubauer and Martin Jones start turning in good performances each night.
Tentacle Tales
The Sabres are 0-4-0 all-time against the Kraken.
Beniers’ five-game goal streak is the longest in Seattle franchise history.
Vince Dunn had an assist to extend his point streak to four straight games.
With two assists, Burakovsky has a four-game point streak.
There’s an old saying that it’s hard to play hockey from behind, and Monday night the Kraken made sure they wouldn’t have to, scoring thrice in the first period and holding on for a 4-0 blanking of the Montreal Canadiens at the Bell Centre.
“We had a great start to the game, we had a really good first period,” Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said. “[It’s] the way that you want to come out on the road, and we not only built a lead, but we played a really good first period that set us up.”
Seattle has won five straight and opened a tough seven-game road trip with four consecutive wins.
Martin Jones made a fifth straight start and turned away 21 shots for his second shutout of the season.
“They can be a dangerous team,” Jones said. “They definitely have skill up front and can be dangerous off the rush. We just had to play smart and make sure we were keeping guys in front of us, and we did a good job of that today.”
The Kraken had goals from four different players including defenseman Vince Dunn who has scored in three straight and added an assist tonight. Daniel Sprong, Eeli Tolvanen, and Matty Beniers each scored for Seattle (23-12-4), which will try for its sixth win in a row Tuesday night in Buffalo.
“We’re a deep team, we rely on everyone to win games,” Dunn said. “You see in the Ottawa game we had eight different players scoring goals, so that’s really big for the team right now, especially in the second half [of the season].”
Sam Montembeault made 37 saves for Montreal (16-22-3), who are 1-2-1 all-time against the Kraken.
The Kraken took 15 of the game’s first 16 shots on goal and scored three times to take early control of the game.
Tolvanen opened the scoring at 6:54 of the first period when he got a cross-crease pass from a pinching Dunn and slammed in his third goal with the Kraken to make it 1-0.
While that would be all the offense Seattle would need, it added on and went ahead 2-0 on the power play at 10:01 with a one-time slapper from the circle by Sprong who continues his hot stretch.
Dunn put the exclamation point on the period when he made it 3-0 with a big slapshot from the point at 14:20. It was his seventh goal of the season and 10th point over his last six games.
“Dunner’s just playing with confidence,” Hakstol said. “He’s doing a lot of the little things. When you look at the way he’s getting us out of the zone, he’s defending well, but he’s using his feet, he’s playing fast.”
He has also had the primary assist on all three of Tolvanen’s goals with the Kraken.
“For me, it’s just finding open space,” Dunn said. “A lot of my goals right now are coming from the forwards doing a lot of work down low and finding me, or off the rush. A lot of credit to them, I think our forwards are working really hard as a group right now.”
Beniers found the empty net to make it 4-0 at 18:57 of the third to finish the scoring.
Martin Jones stays hot
Jones didn’t have much of a workload in the first period but did make 15 saves over the final two periods and helped kill off two Montreal power plays.
Jones has been the goalie in all five games of this Kraken win streak and allowed only eight goals. Hakstol started going with the hot hand once Philipp Grubauer was healthy, but Jones has been as hot as you can be over the last five.
“We’re just playing really fast and we’re kind of smothering teams,” Jones said. “We’re not giving them a lot of time and space. We’re checking hard and it’s resulting in a lot of O-zone time for us.”
He has an 18-5-0 record this season, which is the most wins he’s had since he won 36 for the San Jose Sharks during the 2018-19 campaign. All that being said, Grubauer most likely will start Tuesday in the second of back-to-back road games against the Sabres.
Tentacle Tales
The Kraken are 5-0-0 since the New Year and lead the NHL in wins and points over that span.
Dunn leads all NHL defenders in scoring over the last five games.
The Kraken are 26 points better than they were at this point last season.
Jones picked up career shutout No. 27 in the NHL.
Jared McCann had his three-game goal scoring streak snapped.
Everett Fitzhugh checks in with Darren from Montreal, where the Seattle Kraken are prepping for their game against the Canadiens. With Seattle on a four-game win streak and the longest road trip of the season, the Sound Of Hockey Podcast thought it was a good time to chat with the team’s radio voice to get his take on what’s been happening on this trip.
Monday Musings is a collection of random thoughts and observations about the last week of activity from the hockey world with an emphasis on the Kraken and other happenings around the Puget Sound hockey community.
Kraken thoughts
The boys are rolling
The Kraken have won four straight games to start the new year, and they are doing it impressive fashion. They beat the Islanders, Oilers, Leafs, and Senators all by three goals or more. They are getting back to the Kraken style of hockey with more of a defense-first mindset that makes them tough to play against and limits the quality shots by opponents.
We have talked about it numerous times, but Seattle’s strength is its depth of scoring. In November, when the Kraken went 10-1-1, the top goal scorers were Andre Burakovsky, Jared McCann, Jordan Eberle, and Matty Beniers. In December, only McCann would score more than two goals in that group, and the team needed to also rely more on Daniel Sprong and Ryan Donato for their goal scoring (six and five goals respectively in the month of December).
Getting contributions from guys like Sprong and Donato is great and important for the overall success of the Kraken, but relying on depth players to be the offensive leaders created a challenge for the team. That was reflected in the Kraken’s December record of 4-7-1.
It is early, but January is looking more like November than December. We are just four games into the month, but everyone is contributing again. Beniers and McCann have three goals each. Burakovsky scored his first goal in 11 games. Bjorkstrand has two goals in January and appears to be heating up. They made a big deal about it on the TV broadcast, but the Kraken’s 8-4 victory over the Ottawa Senators had eight unique goal scorers for the Kraken.
Shane Wright decision
After winning the IIHF World Junior Championship for Team Canada on Wednesday, the Kraken assigned Shane Wright back to his junior team, the Kingston Frontenacs in the OHL. If you have been listening to the Sound Of Hockey Podcast, we have been speculating that would be the decision made by Ron Francis and company. There are a few reasons why the decision to send Wright back to the OHL was an easy one.
Winning. The team is winning and is in a great position to make the playoffs. All skaters in the bottom six of the forward group give the Kraken a better chance to win now than an 19-year-old with eight career NHL games.
Health. One of the strengths of this team this season is how healthy it has been [knock on wood]. Theoretically, if there were more injuries, Wright would be able to slip into the lineup from time to time. He did get that opportunity when McCann was out because of injury in two games in early November. This enabled him to play further up the lineup and log more minutes compared to his early season games on the fourth line, where he averaged less than seven minutes a game.
He needs to play. Before being loaned to Team Canada for World Juniors, Wright played only 13 pro games, eight with the Kraken and five with the Coachella Valley Firebirds on the AHL conditioning assignment. If he stayed with the Kraken, he would be unlikely to play regular games, and even when he would play, the minutes would be limited. In the OHL, he has the likelihood to play 30 regular-season games and average around 20 minutes per game. Assuming he is traded from Kingston, he is also likely to get a playoff round or two in the OHL playoffs.
As much as the team would love to get Wright into the lineup and help develop his game at NHL speed, it simply does not make sense right now given the position the team is in halfway through the season. Plus, although this wasn’t the deciding factor, there is the added benefit that the first year of his entry-level contract now will not kick in until next season.
Other Kraken musings:
With the Kraken win at Ottawa Saturday night, they improved their road record to 12-4-2. Meanwhile, their record at Climate Pledge Arena is 10-8-2. That is a mystery to me.
One area of concern I have is the faceoff percentages of the Kraken. I know faceoffs are not as important as they once were, but Seattle has been bottom five in faceoff win percentage all season. In January, they are averaging under 40 percent in faceoffs. I hope to dig into this a bit more next week.
The Kraken have had an open roster spot since Gustav Olofsson was returned to Coachella Valley on Dec. 17. That’s another testament to the Kraken’s depth and health this season.
Kraken fifth-round selection from the 2021 draft, Jacob Melanson, had seven points over three games last week, including a hat trick yesterday against the Shawinigan Cataractes. After two good seasons since his draft year, Melanson is tracking better than a normal fifth-round selection and will likely play next season in Coachella Valley. Melanson was recently traded within the QMJHL from Acadie-Bathurst to Sherbrooke.
Speaking of Coachella Valley. The Firebirds are in first place in the AHL’s Pacific Division and are 8-1-0-1 in their last 10. What is 8-1-0-1, you ask? That’s eight wins, one regulation loss, zero overtime losses, and one shootout loss, obviously.
The Firebirds shootout loss came yesterday to the Ontario Reign. In net for the Reign was none other than Cal Petersen. Petersen was assigned to the AHL after he allowed four goals over 16 shots in the LA Kings “thrilling” 9-8 loss to the Kraken on Nov. 29.
Kraken themes for the week ahead
This road trip was expected to be the granddaddy of all road trips for the Kraken this season. If you would have asked me what success would be, given the teams they are playing on this extended swing, I would have said 50 percent of the points available. Of a possible 14 points, they already have six with eight still on the table. The remaining games on this trip are a bit tricky, though.
They have two good opponents sandwiched by two not-so-good opponents. Ironically, the Kraken have lost to the two bad teams in Chicago and Montreal and beat one of the good teams when Buffalo visited Seattle in October. It is reasonable to expect four of the remaining eight points in this stretch, but it sure would be nice to come back home with even more than that. I am really intrigued to see how the Kraken match up with Boston, which has been the best team in the league by a long shot this season.
I also want to specifically see redemption against Montreal and Chicago. The Kraken were the better team in both of those earlier matchups, but for various reasons, conceded the games to inferior opponents.
Player performance / Stick taps
Vince Dunn (SEA) – seven points in four games this calendar year including two goals. Prior to his goal against the Maple Leafs on Thursday, Dunn had not scored since Nov. 27.
Jack Hughes (NJD) – the 2019 first overall draft pick for the New Jersey Devils has scored at least a goal in each of his last five games and has six goals in four games in 2023.
Martin Jones (SEA) – Jones has started all four games for the Kraken this year and has a 4-0 record to show for it. The team in front of him is playing well and limiting the number of quality opportunities for opposing teams, but he has made some saves at key moments in just about every game. Jones is the only goalie in the league to have four wins in 2023 and will start again against the Canadiens Monday.
Goal of the week
This week’s goal of the week comes from Chicago Blackhawks rookie Lukas Reichel and his first National Hockey League goal. Gotta love his pass to Seth Jones there as well.
This is a recycled chart, but every once in a while I like to refresh the data to see if the narrative has changed. It hasn’t. The Kraken continue to be one of the most improved teams in the goal-scoring category across the league.
Thanks again for all your engagement and questions on these posts. If you have anything you want me to look into, feel free to leave your suggestions in the comments.
