In what felt like a must-win game, the Seattle Kraken delivered in the second leg of a back-to-back, defeating the Los Angeles Kings 4-2 Wednesday night at Crypto.com Arena.
The Kings struck first on a power-play goal from Andre Kuzmenko, and after Tuesday night’s loss to the Anaheim Ducks, everyone held their breath wondering if the Kraken were in for another rough night.
Seattle put the doubters to bed quickly, though. The team scored three goals in the next 7:39 to take the lead for good.
The Kraken head into the Olympic break going 11-6-2 in 2026 and have reclaimed third place in the Pacific Division. The win also created separation in the Western Conference playoff race. A three-point buffer now exists between the last wild-card team (Anaheim, 63 points) and the first team out (LA Kings, 60 points). The Kings and Predators play Thursday, so the gap could shrink. But one thing is certain: the Kraken will maintain third place for the duration of the Olympic break.
The Kraken improved to 3-0 against the Kings this season.
Here are the Three Takeaways.
Takeaway 1: Shane Wright heating up
Shane Wright scored two goals for the second time in four games. After netting only seven goals in the first 52 games, he has increased his total to 11. Wright’s first goal came on a nifty steal and pass from Ryan Winterton. Wright pulled the puck to his backhand and beat Darcy Kuemper to tie the game at 1-1.
Wright answered a question from Piper Shaw about his increased scoring:
“Guys are finding me. That’s a big thing. Putting myself in areas to score, trying to get open and shoot the puck as well. Guys are making good plays on the goals, so I’m not having to do too much on them. But it’s always nice to chip in there.”
The key is Wright is getting to the right spots and making himself available. His second goal came on the power play from a Freddy Gaudreau feed. It extended the lead to two goals and provided breathing room.
Shane Wright with his second of the night. Great set up by Freddy Gaudreau who is on the second power play unit because Schwartz is out tonight. 4-2 #SeaKrakenpic.twitter.com/mvBEBy1rj8
The Kings converted twice on the power play, both by Andre Kuzmenko. The Kraken have allowed power-play goals in eight of the last nine games. The one game they technically didn’t surrender a power-play goal was last game. But they gave up a goal five seconds after a penalty expired, as Matty Beniers was still trying to rejoin the play. This will be an area of focus when the Kraken return from the break.
The good news: the Kraken didn’t allow any other goals and emerged with the 4-2 victory. The Kings pushed hard, though. They had two goals waived off immediately as the whistle had blown before the puck crossed the line both times.
Trevor Moore gave the Kraken a scare and nearly tied the game in the opening seconds of the third period. The post did its job, though, and after a couple of odd-man rushes for each team, the Kraken settled down and eventually converted on Wright’s power-play goal.
After getting shut out for 55 minutes Tuesday against the Ducks, the Kraken found their scoring touch. They scored four goals and have averaged 3.47 goals per game in 2026. That would rank them third in the NHL for the season.
Chandler Stephenson, Gaudreau, and Wright all enjoyed two-point nights. The offense was clicking.
Jaden Schwartz was out with a lower-body injury. Oscar Fisker-Molgaard was called up to fill in. As a side note, the Kraken are now 3-0 in games Molgaard has played. He wasn’t a big factor in this game, though, as the fourth line played only about six minutes and 30 seconds of ice time. Molgaard and Tye Kartye started the third period, but that was their only shift. Jacob Melanson’s last shift came around the 18-minute mark of the second period.
Although the fourth line didn’t play much in the third, Molgaard’s presence allowed Gaudreau to fill in for Schwartz alongside Stephenson and Eeli Tolvanen. Gaudreau looked great in this game and earned the primary assist on Wright’s second goal on his way to two point night.
Wrapping up
With 19 games played in 2026 and momentum rolling, I’m a little nervous the break is here. The team basically played a playoff hockey schedule, playing almost every other night for the past month-plus and thrived. But the break is well deserved. They definitely have areas to improve—cough, penalty kill—so hopefully they come back Feb. 25 ready to play. After the break, they don’t ease back into it. They head right into a back-to-back, first against the Dallas Stars, then the St. Louis Blues on Feb. 26.
The Kraken have three players—well, now four with Molgaard on the roster—heading to the Olympics. We wish them the best of luck. Dallas has seven players and St. Louis has five in the Olympics, so hopefully the Kraken will be the more rested team and start on time.
Blaiz Grubic
Blaiz Grubic is a contributor at Sound Of Hockey. A passionate hockey fan and player for over 30 years, Blaiz grew up in the Pacific Northwest and is an alumni of Washington State University (Go Cougs!). When he’s not playing, watching, or writing about hockey, he enjoys quality time with his wife and daughter or getting out on a golf course for a quick round. Follow @blaizg on BlueSky or X.
That was not the outcome Seattle Kraken fans were looking for in what was ostensibly a critical pre-Olympic game against the division rival Anaheim Ducks. Seattle ultimately lost 4-2, but it was worse than the score indicated, with the Kraken mounting a too-little-too-late push in the closing minutes after falling behind 4-0 in the third period.
The second period turned the tide of the game, and things went from bad to worse early in the third. By the time Seattle started to push, the mountain was simply too high to climb, giving Anaheim a leg up for third place in the Pacific Division.
Jordan Eberle and Shane Wright scored late in the third, and Philipp Grubauer made several dazzling saves—finishing with 27 stops—but also had a couple of blunders that proved costly.
Here are Three Takeaways from a painful 4-2 Kraken loss to the Ducks.
Takeaway 1: Second-period struggles
When the Kraken have gotten through the first period tied 0-0, they’ve generally fared well this season. That wasn’t the case here.
Matty Beniers took a holding penalty just 1:56 into the second period. Seattle’s penalty kill did its job, but as Beniers stepped back onto the ice, Cutter Gauthier slapped at a bouncing puck from the top of the right circle, and the shot eluded Grubauer to make it 1-0 at 4:01.
Cutter Gauthier breaks the ice, as he did the last time these teams played each other.
Not officially a power-play goal, but it came seconds after Matty Beniers left the box.
From there, Anaheim seized control of the momentum for much of the middle frame.
The real turning point came late in the period, though, after Seattle tilted the ice the other way and had the Ducks on the ropes. Anaheim was hemmed in for nearly a minute and a half and clearly exhausted, with forward Jeffrey Viel limping on one leg after blocking a shot. The Ryan Winterton–Chandler Stephenson–Eeli Tolvanen line was relentless, firing pucks on net and recovering rebounds. Even when the Ducks briefly gained possession, Seattle stole it right back.
The Kraken were in the middle of a change when Shane Wright jumped on the ice and continued the attack, but his attempted low-to-high pass misfired, exited the zone, and ended the sequence.
Just over a minute later, Jacob Trouba scored with a seeing-eye shot through traffic to make it 2-0 with only 32 seconds left in the period. That goal was a killer, and the Kraken failing to capitalize on that extended pressure likely cost them the game.
Takeaway 2: An odd night for Grubauer
For large stretches of the game, Grubauer was sharp and was a big reason Seattle got through the first period unscathed. But it was also one of those familiar nights of yesteryear where strong play was undermined by a couple confusing goals that make you stop and ask whether they should have gone in.
Gauthier’s goal looked stoppable, though it came on a broken play that appeared to catch Grubauer off guard. Alex Killorn’s goal 24 seconds into the third, which effectively put the game out of reach at 3-0, was tougher to grasp. Grubauer appeared to be reading a pass across the slot and lifted his left leg to push laterally, opening his five-hole. Killorn found it.
Alex Killorn makes it 3-0 just 24 seconds into the 3rd.
The worst moment came at 13:54 of the third, when Grubauer took his eye off a rimmed puck behind the net, which hopped over his stick and eventually left Ross Johnston with an open cage.
Salt in the wound for the #SeaKraken. Grubauer takes his eye off the puck and mishandles it, and Ross Johnston ends up with an open net.
There was certainly some bad luck mixed in—Grubauer tracked pucks well for much of the night and made several stops he probably shouldn’t have made—but the mishaps in this one were damaging.
Takeaway 3: Melanson catches Terry
One reason Jacob Melanson has quickly endeared himself to Kraken fans is that his physical play has generally come in the “right way.” He plays hard, makes opponents uncomfortable, and hasn’t taken many penalties.
Late in the second period, though—perhaps in an effort to spark something—Melanson flattened Troy Terry, who was playing his first game back from injury. Replay showed Melanson’s elbow coming up, delivering his first regular-season hit that crossed into questionable territory. (It’s worth remembering Melanson was suspended for a head shot in a preseason game back in 2022.)
Oh, boy. Melanson catches Troy Terry up high right at the 2nd horn, and all hell breaks loose. 😬
Melanson was assessed a 10-minute misconduct and, notably, did not take another shift after exiting the box in the third period. It remains unclear why he didn’t return to the ice.
—
This was a brutal loss given the opportunity Seattle had to create separation in the standings against Anaheim. Now sitting in the final wild-card spot, the Kraken head to Los Angeles on Wednesday with a chance to claw back into third place before the Olympic break—or risk falling out of the playoff picture altogether.
That game is enormous.
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.
“We’re going streaking! Through the quad, and into the gymnasium!” – Frank Ricard, Old School, 2003
The Seattle Kraken have had an up-and-down season, bouncing between winning and losing streaks. Recently, the crew at Sound Of Hockey held a Mailbag segment on Episode 369 of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast. They did not get through every question, but one submission stood out to me and inspired this article.
FMammal asked on the Patreon, “Does it matter if a team is streaky the way the Kraken seem to be, or is the only important thing the point total after all 82 games?”
We are going to take this one level deeper and also explore how streaky teams perform in the playoffs.
Definitions
Let’s start by defining the types of streaks used in this analysis.
Point streak: Three or more consecutive games in which a team earns at least one point in each game. This includes wins of any kind and overtime or shootout losses.
Losing streak: Three or more consecutive games in which a team loses. This includes regulation losses, overtime losses and shootout losses.
Win streak: Three or more consecutive games in which a team wins and earns two points in each game, including regulation, overtime and shootout victories.
To evaluate streakiness and playoff success, I created the following metrics:
Streakiness tier: Low (under 49 games spent in point streaks or losing streaks), Medium (50 to 60 games), High (61 games or more).
Balance ratio: The number of games teams are on point streaks divided by the total number of games on any streak. Any value above 0.50 means a team earned points in more games than it lost while streaking.
Playoff depth score (PDS): Teams earn one point for making the playoffs and one point for each round won. A Stanley Cup champion earns five points. Teams that miss the playoffs earn zero. For example, when Seattle made the playoffs in 2022-23 and lost in the second round, the Kraken earned a PDS of two.
Kraken streaks this season
For this piece, streak data is based on point streaks and losing streaks, unless otherwise noted.
The Kraken rank 13th in the NHL with nine total streaks this season.
The streaks break down as follows:
Five-game point streak (Oct. 9–18): eight of 10 points
Five-game point streak (Oct. 23–Nov. 3): eight of 10 points
Three-game point streak (Nov. 11–15): five of six points
Three-game point streak (Nov. 20–23): five of six points
Six-game losing streak (Nov. 23–Dec. 8): one of 12 points
Four-game losing streak (Dec. 12–18): zero of eight points
10-game point streak (Dec. 20–Jan. 8): 18 of 20 points
Four-game losing streak (Jan. 14–19): one of eight points
Four-game win streak (Jan. 25–31): eight of eight points
It may not feel like it at times, but Seattle has had six point streaks and only three losing streaks. That amounts to 30 games on point streaks and 14 games on losing streaks.
The 10-game point streak ranks sixth in the NHL this season.
Streakiness and playoff results
Data was collected only from seasons in which the Kraken have existed, covering 2021-22 through the current season.
During that span, teams with a balance ratio below 0.50 never made the playoffs. A balance ratio under 0.50 means a team spent more games on losing streaks than point streaks. Losing more games than you win is not a recipe for success.
The heatmap focuses on teams with a balance ratio of 0.51 or higher. The Kraken currently sit at 0.68, based on 30 point-streak games and 14 losing-streak games (30 of 44 games).
Playoff depth score (Number of teams in bucket)
The results seem to align with intuition. Teams with higher balance ratios perform better in the playoffs. There is also a trend showing that playoff depth score improves as streakiness increases for teams above a 0.68 balance ratio.
Balance ratio 0.68–0.84: PDS rises from 1.57 to 1.77, a 12.7 percent increase
Balance ratio 0.85–1.00: PDS rises from 2.25 to 2.60, a 15.6 percent increase
The Kraken currently sit at a 0.68 balance ratio and are trending toward 67 total streak games. That would place them in the High streakiness tier.
Among the 13 teams in that bucket, 12 made the playoffs in the last four seasons, and eight reached at least the second round. The 2023-24 Edmonton Oilers advanced the furthest, losing in the Stanley Cup Final.
Seattle sits on the cutoff line. When teams drop below a 0.68 balance ratio, only eight of 16 made the playoffs. Of those eight, six entered as wild cards and two finished third in their division. In every case, those teams opened the playoffs as underdogs, drawing higher-seeded opponents and facing a steeper path to advancing.
A necessary caveat
This heatmap has a flaw.
As streakiness increases, teams with strong balance ratios are also winning more games overall. That inflates playoff success. Looking at average standings points for teams in the 0.68–0.84 bucket shows the issue clearly.
Low streakiness: 98 points
Medium streakiness: 102 points
High streakiness: 106 points
It would be expected that a 106-point team would perform better in the playoffs than a 98-point team, and that is exactly what is being shown here.
Standings points matter more
Breaking standings points into buckets and slicing them by streakiness tier produces inconsistent results. If streakiness alone drove playoff success, each standings-point bucket would show the same trend. The buckets do not show this.
The consistent signal is simpler as shown in the next chart. As standings points increase, playoff depth scores increase. Better teams tend to go further in the playoffs.
Final takeaway
So, does it matter if a team is streaky, or is the final point total all that matters?
The standings point total matters most.
How a team gets there matters less than the final point total. Streaks can help build momentum, but they ultimately show up in the standings. Make the playoffs, and the slate is mostly clean.
Streakiness only becomes an issue when losing streaks pile up. As long as the Kraken keep their balance ratio at or above 0.68, they are positioning themselves to qualify and avoid the most difficult first-round matchups.
Some bonus charts
As part of this research, I pulled additional streak data to provide more context. The charts below show how the Kraken have compared to league averages over the past four seasons in terms of their longest winning, point and losing streaks.
As the season continues, the focus should remain on the standings rather than the emotional swings that come with streaky play. If Seattle keeps earning points at its current rate, the path to the playoffs remains clear, regardless of how bumpy the ride feels along the way.
Blaiz Grubic
Blaiz Grubic is a contributor at Sound Of Hockey. A passionate hockey fan and player for over 30 years, Blaiz grew up in the Pacific Northwest and is an alumni of Washington State University (Go Cougs!). When he’s not playing, watching, or writing about hockey, he enjoys quality time with his wife and daughter or getting out on a golf course for a quick round. Follow @blaizg on BlueSky or X.
Never a doubt! Not to sound hyperbolic, but of the 26 wins the Seattle Kraken have now racked up this season, defeating the Vegas Golden Knights 3-2 in their building on Saturday may have been the biggest one yet.
Seattle jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first period, let it slip away in the second, but recovered in the third and then held on for dear life to secure a victory that pulled them within three points of the first-place Golden Knights and opened a small two-point cushion on Anaheim and Los Angeles, their next two opponents.
Eeli Tolvanen, Jared McCann, and Kaapo Kakko had the goals, and Chandler Stephenson recorded two assists against his former team.
Here are Three Takeaways from a huge 3-2 Kraken win over the Golden Knights.
Takeaway 1: Joey Daccord was the difference
This team has gone as its goaltending has gone. When the goalies have been outstanding, the Kraken have won. When they’ve been just OK, they haven’t. Lately, both Joey Daccord and Philipp Grubauer have been outstanding, and the Kraken have—unsurprisingly—won five of their last six.
After a stretch of alternating goalies from game to game, coach Lane Lambert recently gave Grubauer two straight starts against the Islanders and Ducks. It had been a while since Daccord played consecutive games, but Lambert gave Joey the nod again Saturday after a solid outing Thursday against Toronto, and Daccord rewarded him.
Daccord stopped 27 of 29 shots, plainly outplaying his counterpart at the other end, Akira Schmid, who allowed three goals on 23 shots and continued a mediocre season.
Joey was especially big in the third period. A few minutes after Kakko restored Seattle’s 3-2 lead, Adam Larsson joined the rush as the trailer, took a feed from McCann, and rifled a shot wide of Schmid. Larsson missed badly enough that the puck rimmed around to Jack Eichel on the half wall, springing Vegas the other way. Having taken himself out of the play, Larsson couldn’t recover in time, and Eichel easily sent Ivan Barbashev in alone on a breakaway.
Barbashev—who had already scored once in the game—cruised down Las Vegas Boulevard and ripped a shot that Daccord snared to keep Seattle in front.
🗣JOEYYYYYYYYYY!
Ivan Barbashev gets a breakaway after Adam Larsson slid down for a shot and missed wide.
Then, with time winding down, Daccord was exceptional in the final two minutes, battling through traffic and tracking shots off weird, broken plays and bouncing pucks.
When the horn sounded, Daccord celebrated accordingly.
NEVER A DOUBT! 🎉
What a celebration by Joey Daccord, as the #SeaKraken hold on to defeat the 1st-place Vegas Golden Knights, 3-2.
Any time a team coughs up a two-goal lead—especially in the fashion Seattle did in the second period—it’s not a great feeling heading into the third.
The Kraken had opened the scoring after Stephenson set up Ryan Winterton, who created a rebound for Tolvanen at 6:50 of the first. McCann followed that up with a one-time missile off a Vince Dunn feed on the power play to make it 2-0 at 13:04.
MCCANN CAN! 🚨
Power-play goal on a beautiful setup, Stephenson->Dunn->McCann->🥅
Three straight games with goals for McCann, 10th in January, 200th of his career.
That was McCann’s 10th goal of the month (tying Matty Beniers, who set a franchise record for goals in a month last game), 200th of his career, and fourth in three games.
It was an excellent first period, punctuated by Jacob Melanson nearly putting Jonas Rondbjerg through the curved glass by the Kraken bench with one of his franchise-record 12 hits on the night.
“We’ve talked about our starts, and it’s the third game in a row, I think, we scored first. The stats don’t lie,” Lambert said. “The guys have done a good job of making sure that they’re ready to go. It’s not that they weren’t [doing that] before, but I think there’s just a little extra focus that we had to have.”
The Kraken Hockey Network noted that Seattle is now 19-6-3 when scoring first this season and 20-0-0 when building a two-goal lead, underscoring just how critical those starts have been.
After the strong opening frame, the second period felt different. Vegas came out visibly intent on shifting momentum. Eichel found Barbashev with an elite pass to cut the deficit to 2-1 at 8:52, and Mitch Marner tied it with 11 seconds left after Seattle gave the Golden Knights’ lethal power play two straight opportunities.
Historically, giving up a tying goal that late in the second can be a backbreaker. But to Seattle’s credit, the group reset during the intermission, got Kakko’s goal off a fortunate bounce three minutes into the third, and then committed to protecting the lead the rest of the way.
KAAAAAAAAPO KAKKO! 🚨
Kaedan Korczak knocks down Adam Larsson's shot nicely for Kakko, and he lofts it past Schmid.
“The message was, ‘It doesn’t matter how we got here. If we win a period, we win a game on the road in this building,’” Lambert said. “Whether you’re up 2-0, down 2-0, it doesn’t matter. The score is 2-2 right now, go win a period, and they did.”
Takeaway 3: Another huge win
The streakiness of this Kraken team has been wild this season. They lost 10 of 11 between November and December, then won eight of nine and went on a 10-game point streak from late December into early January. After another skid—losing six of seven—they’ve once again rebounded, winning five of six.
After the win over the Islanders, it felt like if Seattle could string together a run before the Olympic break, it could climb right back toward the top of the Pacific Division.
Lo and behold, aside from two brutal periods against Anaheim on Jan. 23, the Kraken have been playing some of their best hockey of the season and are now just three points from first place. Contributions are coming from throughout the lineup, and the goaltending has been excellent.
Now, Seattle gets a rare two-day break before facing those same Ducks in Anaheim on Tuesday and then closing out pre-Olympic play the following night in Los Angeles.
Talk about big games.
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.
Welcome to “Down on the Farm,” your weekly Seattle Kraken prospects update. This week, we’re ranking which Seattle Kraken prospects may have the most value in a deadline (or offseason) trade for an NHL upgrade. After that, we’ll pass along Kraken prospect news, including a couple of injury returns, all-shifts video, data updates, the Sound Of Hockey Prospect of the Week, and a preview of the week ahead, as always.
If you have a Seattle Kraken prospect–related question you’d like to see featured in a future column, drop us a note below or on X or BlueSky at @deepseahockey or @sound_hockey.
Kraken trade value tiers
The Seattle Kraken are seeking a top-line scorer to elevate the NHL team for the medium-to-long term. This has been reported and speculated about with increasing frequency of late.
The mindset is not a “new” development, though. Anyone who has followed the team closely knows the Kraken have lacked a high-end difference maker. Solving that deficiency has been a focus of new Kraken general manager Jason Botterill since day one. Indeed, during Botterill’s introductory conference with Seattle Kraken season ticket holders on May 22, 2025, he noted the strong foundation of veterans and other assets already in place. He said his job was to “drop in elite talent.”
Since that job remains incomplete, it makes sense that the Kraken would be exploring the market with added urgency as teams approach the Olympic break and the ensuing trade deadline. Due diligence is necessary, but it should be emphasized that the type of player Seattle is targeting rarely moves at the trade deadline. If the right player is not available now, efforts will continue into the offseason.
Assuming the right player is available, though, what assets do the Kraken have to trade? Inspired by a recent post in The Athletic, which tier-ranked the young players and draft assets several prominent deadline “buyers” could offer, I figured it would be useful to map out the potential “market value” of Seattle’s development pieces. (This focus on “market value” in a trade is a fundamentally different exercise from my own subjective prospect rankings, which focus on projected on-ice value for the Kraken.)
The Athletic used the following tiers: “Tier 1: Premium young assets,” “Tier 2: Strong B-level assets,” “Tier 3: B-grade assets,” and “Tier 4: Quality Trade Chips.” I’ll use a similar approach (with only one minor change) in considering Seattle’s under-23 players and draft picks. Let’s dive in.
Tier 1: Premium young players
Berkly Catton, 20, F, Seattle Kraken. Catton has the most value of any young player or draft asset in the system. He has high-end offensive instincts and play-creation ability. While he doesn’t have elite speed, size, or strength, he wins more than his fair share of puck battles and is a threat on the forecheck with precision stick work and smarts. He has point-per-game, all-three-zone upside from any forward position (though the goal totals may never be gaudy). Every team would want this player.
Jake O’Brien, 18, F, Brantford Bulldogs. It was rumored that Seattle did not want to part with the draft pick that became Jake O’Brien in an offseason deal for Jordan Kyrou, and O’Brien has only reinforced his stock with a solid OHL season. He is a play creator on the rush and from the half wall on the power play. He’s not overly engaged off the puck, but his fundamentals are trending in the right direction. I don’t envision him as a defensive or forechecking liability. He has a willingness to get net front that should only improve if he can fill out his 6-foot-2 frame a bit more. He may not be every team’s cup of tea, but I suspect he would have premium, “headliner” value in most trades.
Shane Wright, 22, F, Seattle Kraken. Elliotte Friedman’s musing about a potential Shane Wright-for-Alexis Lafrenière swap has me concerned that public perception of Wright’s value may be lower than his fair, “true” value. This suggests to me that the Kraken would be wise to “hold” Wright, whom I still believe in as a core, offense-first, top-six center. That said, if the Kraken were “motivated” to move Wright, it would likely be due to internal concern that his market stock is trending out of the “premium” category and closer to the “Tier 2” category below. Wright likely has more value than O’Brien to a “retooling” team, whereas O’Brien may have more value to a true “rebuilding” club.
Shane Wright skates at Climate Pledge Arena (Photo/Brian Liesse)
Tier 1A: Premium draft assets
Seattle 2026 first-round pick. The Seattle Kraken own their own first-round pick in 2026, which should fall in the early-to-mid portion of the round. This draft class has solid depth through the mid-first round, so the pick should likely have more market value than any other player in the system. This pick would also have more value than the players and picks The Athletic has in its “Tier 2,” hence the addition of “Tier 1A.”
Tier 2: B+-grade assets
Jani Nyman, 21, F, Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL). Nyman did not earn the role to leverage his goal-scoring skill at the NHL level this season, but he quickly demonstrated that the net-driving mentality and lethal shot are still there when he was reassigned to the AHL, scoring seven goals in 12 games. Combined with a 6-foot-4 frame and the ability to protect pucks, draw penalties, and throw the occasional hit, there is likely a team out there that views him as an offense-forward, middle-six winger. He should have value to at least some teams in a package with another similar asset or as a secondary piece in a bigger deal.
Tampa Bay 2026 first-round pick.
Seattle 2027 first-round pick.
Tier 3: B-grade assets
Tampa Bay 2027 first-round pick.
Jagger Firkus, 21, F, Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL). Firkus’s offensive smarts, playmaking, and crafty shot have found their way to the AHL level this season. He has averaged almost a point per game and earned an All-Star nod despite his size disadvantage. If he were bigger, his market value would almost certainly be higher. As it stands, he likely straddles the boundary between Tier 3 and Tier 4. It’s possible his trade value is at its peak amidst this AHL breakout, but I’m increasingly confident in Firkus’ pro future. I wouldn’t want to include him as a mere “throw in” in a deal.
Tier 4: Other quality trade chips
Oscar Fisker Molgaard, 20, F, Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL). Molgaard almost certainly has some trade value after a solid run in both the SHL and AHL, but I find it unlikely the market would value him commensurate with his fair, projected on-ice contributions as a bottom-six forward.
Nathan Villeneuve, 19, F, Windsor Spitfires (OHL). Villeneuve not only brings physicality and leadership to the ice, he is sixth in the OHL in points per game. With multiple possible avenues to the NHL (well-rounded middle-six forward or bottom-line grinder), he’s a relatively high-certainty junior player. This gives him more value than your average junior scoring forward.
Julius Miettinen, 20, F, Everett Silvertips (WHL). Similar to Villeneuve, Miettinen’s size and defensive game complement a solid scoring profile, which gives him a few different ways to help an NHL team.
Blake Fiddler, 18, D, Edmonton Oil Kings (WHL). Fiddler has size and skating ability from the right side. Even if the flashes of offensive upside do not coalesce, it’s easy to imagine a Will Borgen-type career for the player. These types of players are coveted. His stock is lower than it might be simply because he still has a fair amount of development ahead.
Seattle’s four 2026 and 2027 second-round picks.
Missed the cut
I considered including Nikke Kokko (21, G, Coachella Valley Firebirds) in Tier 4, but he has never gained the reputation of a high-end goalie prospect despite his solid play at every level.
Young fourth-liners like Jacob Melanson (22, F, Seattle Kraken) and Ryan Winterton (22, F, Seattle Kraken) wouldn’t figure to return much in a trade and, therefore, almost certainly have more value on this team than anywhere else.
Tyson Jugnauth (21, D, Coachella Valley Firebirds) could intrigue other clubs amidst a strong offensive rookie year in the AHL, but I suspect defensive concerns keep him a notch below the “quality” tier.
Carson Rehkopf (21, F, Coachella Valley Firebirds) and Eduard Sale (20, F, Coachella Valley Firebirds) are two players one would hope to see in the tiers above, but their AHL play hasn’t justified it as of yet.
Notes on four Kraken prospects
Jake O’Brien | F | Brantford Bulldogs (OHL)
Jake O’Brien is back in the regular lineup with the Bulldogs, taking heavy minutes and producing at a high clip. He piled up two goals and four assists in two games this past week, which earns him Sound Of Hockey Prospect of the Week. He exited the lineup last Friday with eight minutes left in regulation, but returned and played a full load on Sunday, so hopefully there is no reason for concern there. Check out his shifts from Friday’s game below.
Logan Morrison | F | Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL)
Morrison flies under the radar as an older, undrafted free agent. Indeed, he’s probably in the “veteran leader” category for this year’s young AHL club. That said, he brings playable offensive instincts and finishing to the center position. His challenge is that he likely falls short of a traditional top-nine projection but also isn’t a classical fourth liner either. He has points in 14 of the Firebirds’ last 18 games and scored the team’s only goal in a 2–1 loss to the Colorado Eagles on Wednesday.
Oscar Fisker Mølgaard | F | Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL)
Mølgaard has been absent from the Coachella Valley Firebirds lineup for the last two games with an upper-body injury. He remains out of the lineup for the Firebirds game today, Friday, Jan. 30. The team characterized it as a day-to-day injury, so hopefully it will not pose a threat to Mølgaard’s opportunity to represent Denmark in the upcoming Olympic Games. Either way, the Firebirds will have to navigate the coming weeks without this critical player.
Kaden Hammell | D | Coachella Valley Firebirds (AHL)
For his part, Kaden Hammell is out week-to-week with a lower-body injury. This is a tough break for the young defenseman, who has exceeded expectations in seizing AHL playing time. Lukas Dragicevic should be in the lineup regularly in Hammell’s absence.
Kraken prospects data update
Alexis Bernier was scoreless in his first two games of the season this past week, but seemingly came through the contests without a setback, which is great news for the defenseman. Look for him to build up and take on more significant minutes as Chicoutimi moves toward the QMJHL playoffs.
Barrett Hall had two assists in two games last week. With 10 goals and 15 assists in 26 games, he has already surpassed his point total in 34 games from last season. He is third on the Huskies in scoring.
Semyon Vyazovoy has been the clear starter for his KHL team for the last couple months and has rewarded that coaching decision with a sterling run of play. He is 10-2-1 in his last 13 games.
We mentioned Jack Lafontaine’s strong play for the Mavericks and Firebirds last week. There was a good interview with LaFontaine on this past week’s Fire & Ice Podcast. Check it out. And don’t be afraid to add the podcast to your regular rotation. Judd Spicer does a great job updating the past week for the Firebirds.
Sound Of Hockey Prospect of the Week tracker
3: Jagger Firkus, Kim Saarinen
2: Jake O’Brien, Julius Miettinen, Nathan Villeneuve
The Beanpot semifinals are this coming Monday, Feb. 2, 2026. Ben MacDonald’s Harvard Crimson will take on the Boston College Eagles in your Deep Sea Hockey Game of the Week. The matchup is available to stream outside the New England area on ESPN+.
Tracking 2026 NHL Draft prospects: Xavier Villeneuve
Xavier Villeneuve is a five-foot-11, offense-first blueliner who checked in at No. 9 on the midseason Sound Of Hockey Big Board. The skill is there to break the puck out, feed the transition game, and create offense. That said, he could be off the board for some teams as a sub-6-foot defenseman. I think it’s fair to say he’s more talented than any of the “smaller” blueliners in last year’s draft, but it’s also fair to note that zero sub-6-foot defensemen were drafted last year. Zero. Where Villeneuve and fellow undersized blueliner Ryan Lin go in the 2026 NHL Draft will be a storyline to watch. They’re still likely first-round picks, but do they fall a bit farther than expected?
Curtis is a Sound Of Hockey contributor and member of the Kraken press corps. Curtis is an attorney by day, and he has read the NHL collective bargaining agreement and bylaws so you don’t have to. He can be found analyzing the Kraken, NHL Draft, and other hockey topics on Twitter and Bluesky @deepseahockey.
…And just like that, the Seattle Kraken have vaulted into third place in the Pacific Division. It’s wild to think that coming into Thursday’s game, the Kraken (24-19-9) and the Toronto Maple Leafs (24-20-9) had nearly identical records and the same number of standings points. Yet Seattle entered the night right on the cusp of re-entering the playoff picture—which they did, thanks to their win and some coinciding losses around the division—while the Maple Leafs have all but packed it in and appear ready to go into seller mode.
That’s how big the gap is right now between the Eastern and Western Conferences. Now sitting at 59 points, Seattle jumped over Los Angeles, San Jose, and Anaheim to move into the all-important third spot in the Pacific Division. Meanwhile, the Maple Leafs—at 57 points—slid to last place in the Atlantic, a whopping 10 points out of the final Wild Card position.
The jump up the standings came thanks to a solid 5-2 Kraken win over Toronto, a game in which Shane Wright scored twice, Brandon Montour and Jared McCann each had a goal and an assist, and Matty Beniers set a franchise record with his 10th goal in a single month. It also helps that Seattle has now won four of its last five games.
“We’re dialed into playing the right way,” coach Lane Lambert said. “It’s not always perfect, but when you try and play the right way, I’ve said it all year long, often times you end up on the right side of it, and you give yourself a good chance to win. And that’s what we’ve been doing lately, so credit to our guys.”
Here are Three Takeaways.
Takeaway 1: Shane Wright night
We saw last season that when Shane Wright starts putting the puck in the net, his game looks different. His confidence seems to balloon with production, perhaps because he starts believing in his shot and no longer hesitates to show off his quick release.
Wright’s two-goal night against Toronto snapped a 12-game goalless drought and gave him his eighth and ninth tallies of the season.
The first came off a simple play by Jaden Schwartz, who sent the puck toward the net from distance and created a juicy rebound off Anthony Stolarz’s pad. Wright jumped on it and chipped it home at 6:23 of the second period to restore a 2-1 lead after Nicholas Robertson had tied the game late in the first.
WRIGHT AS RAIN! ☔️ 🚨
Schwartz returns to the game and creates a rebound for Shane Wright, who goes BarrDown Studios™️.
His second goal was even more critical—and it was a beauty. Wright was whistled for a questionable holding penalty at 4:57 of the third, and Morgan Rielly scored on the ensuing power play to cut Seattle’s lead from 3-1 to 3-2. (Thankfully, Montour had added an insurance goal earlier in the period off a fantastic rush by Freddy Gaudreau.)
If Wright felt any guilt over the soft call, he wasted no time making up for it. The Kraken were pressuring on the forecheck when Montour read Matias Maccelli’s breakout pass, disrupting the outlet and nudging the puck into open ice for Wright. Wright skated into it, rotated his body into shooting position at the top of the right circle, and snapped a perfect shot into the top-right corner.
WRIGHT AS RAIN x ✌️! ☔️ 🚨 🚨
It's going to take a LOT to get Shane Wright out of Seattle. His second of the night is a snipe. 🎯
“He can shoot, and it was very evident [tonight],” Lambert said. “I liked his first goal when he went to the net. And that was a huge goal for us when he came off the wall there [in the third]. He’s had opportunities, he’s hit posts, he’s hit cross bars. He finally got rewarded tonight for that one.”
Added Wright: “The coaches always tell me to shoot a little more. I think I can always put a few more pucks on net. And, yeah, nice to [get a couple tonight].”
Now we’ll see if the two-goal night sparks something bigger. It took Wright a long time to really get rolling last season, but once he did, he became one of Seattle’s best players down the stretch.
Takeaway 2: First line still clicking
The top line delivered again Thursday, with Matty Beniers opening the scoring on Seattle’s first shot of the game and Jared McCann sealing it with an empty-netter late in the third.
On the opening goal, McCann found Beniers slicing through a leaky Toronto defense just a minute into the contest. Beniers glided down the slot unmolested and snapped a shot that hit Stolarz’s left pad before popping into the net.
MATTY MAGIC! 🚨
Beniers gives the #SeaKraken an early 1-0 lead and sets a new franchise record for goals in a month.
The goal gave Beniers his 10th of January, setting a new franchise record for most goals in a single month. The previous mark of nine, held by Jordan Eberle, dates back to November of the inaugural season. It’s worth noting that the Kraken have played 16 games this month, while Eberle’s nine-goal stretch came in just 13.
BUT…
Beniers is absolutely rolling right now. Lambert has been praising the work Beniers has put in to improve his offensive game, and he echoed those sentiments again Thursday.
“I just continue to talk about the fact of his evolvement since the beginning of the year, offensively,” Lambert said. “Again, Chris Taylor and Justin Rai have done a great job of working with him on offensive concepts, putting himself in position to— whether it be spacing or whatever. The goal he scored tonight, he found that late spacing, so to speak.
“He did a real good job of driving to the net, and McCann made a great play. So I think he’s being rewarded for his efforts, but also, there’s a lot of good philosophies that have come out of our coaching department, from that standpoint, and not from me.”
Meanwhile, McCann is right on Beniers’ heels with nine goals in the month. He followed his four-point night Tuesday with another two-point effort against Toronto and now has nine points in his last five games.
This top trio looks dangerous right now.
Takeaway 3: Schwartz recovers, but Catton leaves
There were two separate injuries to Kraken forwards in the first period. First, Jaden Schwartz went knee-on-knee with Nicolas Roy, appearing to hurt the same knee that kept him out for more than a month.
I fully expected the Kraken to announce Schwartz was done for the night—and perhaps longer—but instead, he returned to the Seattle bench a few minutes later and immediately resumed playing. He did limp back to the dressing room again late in the period, but he was back for the second and helped create Wright’s first goal.
Oh, boy. Jaden Schwartz goes knee-on-knee with Nic Roy and needs help down the tunnel.
“I can’t say enough about [Schwartz’s performance], actually,” Lambert said. “There was a point in time when we were down to 10 forwards. I think that Jaden showed us what veteran leadership and a guy who’s been around the game a long time can do. He knew what position and what situation we were in, and he came back.”
The reason Seattle was briefly down to 10 forwards was that while Schwartz was trying to shake off the injury, Berkly Catton was leveled at the Toronto blue line by Oliver Ekman-Larsson at 12:04 of the first. The 20-year-old forward stayed down for a moment before eventually gathering his belongings and exiting the game.
To be clear, I don’t think Ekman-Larsson intended to deliver a head shot. Catton leaned in and made contact face-first with Ekman-Larsson’s shoulder. That said, I still believe there needs to be an immediate response from the Kraken. Accidental or not, teams shouldn’t be able to lay a finger on No. 27.
There wasn’t much of a response beyond Jacob Melanson hitting Ekman-Larsson in the second period and exchanging a few words with him.
The players didn’t seem particularly heated about the hit after the game.
“I wanted to obviously make sure ‘Cats’ was good,” Montour said. “It wasn’t necessarily one that I’m probably going to jump in necessarily. I’ve got a few issues going on myself right now, so I can’t really do much there, but ‘Cats’ was all right. [Somebody] said it was somewhat clean, just a hard hit. You don’t like to see that. Obviously, I spoke to [Ekman-Larsson] a little bit, he thought it was clean.”
Montour added that he also checked in on Ekman-Larsson’s young family. So, keeping things nice and friendly, I guess.
When I asked Lambert if he would have liked to see a stronger physical response, he said: “It was pretty incidental. There was a couple of guys reaching for the puck, and Ekman-Larsson’s a little bit bigger than Berkly. I thought he got sort of stretched and exposed. But it was a—in my mind—it was a little bit of a hockey play. So, I liked our game overall.”
Now, is it a coincidence that after the Kraken didn’t retaliate, Brandon Carlo went head-hunting on Eeli Tolvanen in the third period?
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Seattle has now closed out its long pre-Olympic homestand and will head on the road for three absolutely massive divisional games against Vegas, Anaheim, and Los Angeles. We won’t see the Kraken back at Climate Pledge Arena until Feb. 28.
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.
