Sunday’s Seattle Kraken practice was a spicy one. Fresh off a 4-1 stinker of a loss to the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday, the team went back to work Sunday at Kraken Community Iceplex, looking to find the consistency that has been lacking in its game. The practice had a more serious tone to it than we’ve seen in most on-ice sessions, as coach Dave Hakstol put his players through drills that focused on speed, quick transitions, and battling physically.
For a moment in the middle of the skate, Hakstol was perhaps the most animated we’ve ever seen him. He stopped a drill and waited for complete quiet in the arena before shouting an obscenity-laced monologue that onlooking media heard loud and clear. We will redact the message a bit, but to give you an idea, it very directly challenged Seattle’s shooting mentality and ended with the phrase, “Shoot the f***ing puck!”
“Direct and honest”
Seattle’s coach finished the practice by having his players gather around the center circle, and he slowly drifted around the face-off dot, looking each player in the eye and delivering another message. This speech was in more of a hushed tone, so we can’t tell you what Hakstol said, but it ended with stick taps from the players.
“We worked on things that we have to work at, and we went out and did it at the pace that’s necessary for it to really become ingrained in what we do,” Hakstol said after practice.
Saturday’s performance by the Kraken was disappointing, no doubt. They were coming off two solid games on the road, earning three out of four possible points against Arizona and Colorado. But Seattle laid an egg in the first period at home against an Oilers club that came in struggling so badly that even with a road win, it still fired its head coach, Jay Woodcroft, and assistant coach, Dave Manson, Sunday morning.
“Direct and honest,” Hakstol said about his message to his team Sunday. “As we look at ourselves individually and collectively, if we take that approach, we’re going to be ok. But right now we have work to do, and that’s what the result from last night says is we have work to do.”
Kraken struggling to string wins together
Last season’s Kraken team built its success around win streaks. They had plenty of stretches where they would win one, lose one, win two, lose two. But then they’d suddenly rip off a bunch of wins in a row and vault up the standings.
They ended the season with five separate win streaks of five games or more, with the first coming between Oct. 29 and Nov. 8. Those calendar dates have come and gone in the 2023-24 season, and so far, the Kraken have failed to win more than two straight.
“This is a tough league to string wins together,” Hakstol said. “I stood here yesterday and said we had done a really good job of gaining points in the majority of our last six-to-eight games, and that’s true. But in between, we’ve had the games where we haven’t been competitive on the points, and those points have gone away for free to our opponent. And that can happen.”
In his 11-year NHL career, defenseman Brian Dumoulin has seen plenty of ups and downs, but he can’t pinpoint what has been plaguing the Kraken so far this season.
“It’s a weird situation,” Dumoulin said. “We felt really good about our game in Arizona and also in Colorado, and obviously got the result in Colorado, and coming home we haven’t been great. We definitely spotted [the Oilers] a few goals, and they had a big 10 minutes there, and we kind of lost the game just in that 10 minutes. It’s just a little bit frustrating in that aspect, but we’ve got to believe in ourselves.”
Dumoulin added that he thinks the Kraken players can do a better job of staying in control of their emotions during games and not letting momentum swings impact the way they play.
“Instead of the highs being high and the lows being low, just kind of be even-keel,” Dumoulin said. “Realize if you played well or if you didn’t, and if you got the result or didn’t, just continue with our structure and live shift to shift instead of looking at it game to game.”
Ryan Winterton “making the most” of his call-up
Kraken forward Ryan Winterton, 20, made his NHL debut in Colorado on Thursday. He had been recalled the day before from AHL Coachella Valley after just seven career games of professional hockey. That may sound like a quick timeline, but his arrival at the sport’s highest level has come with some major bumps in the road.
“It’s surreal, for sure,” Winterton said. “I wouldn’t say I’m surprised [to be here], but it’s definitely been a long journey, you know? A bunch of adversity. It hasn’t been the cleanest ride, that’s for sure, but I’m happy I’m here, and I’m going to make the most of it.”
The Markham, Ontario, native has had a challenging development path. Remember, the entire 2020-21 Ontario Hockey League season was nixed due to COVID, and that caused Winterton to drop to the Kraken in the third round of the 2021 NHL Entry Draft. After getting selected, he then suffered two separate shoulder injuries that limited him to 37 games in 2021-22 and 34 games in 2022-23.
Ryan Winterton skating with the OHL Hamilton Bulldogs (Photo courtesy Hamilton Bulldogs)
Still, the Kraken organization is clearly high on Winterton’s potential as an NHL player and wasted no time in giving him his first call-up to the big club. Firebirds coach Dan Bylsma delivered the news to Winterton over the phone.
“Coach Bylsma called me when I was— we were preparing for a game that night in Coachella, and I was actually taking my pre-game nap,” Winterton remembered. “He called me twice, so I thought I should answer. He gave me the news, and I’ve never really had a smile like that last so long. I think it was a full 24 hours or longer, so it was pretty cool.”
In his whirlwind scramble to meet the Kraken in Denver, Winterton miscalculated his packing.
“You pack a carry-on, and then you kind of live out of that for as long as I’m here,” Winterton said. “I didn’t really pack for this weather, the cold. I was in California, so it was pretty hot. So, I might have to go shopping today or tomorrow— well, today, because we have a game tomorrow.”
As veterans like Brandon Tanev and Jordan Eberle work their way back from injuries (we expect Tanev to return Monday against Colorado, while Eberle is still at least a game or two away), space will have to be made in Seattle’s lineup. But Winterton survived the “cut” Sunday and was kept with the Kraken, while veteran Devin Shore was reassigned to Coachella Valley.
Interestingly, Winterton skated on a potential “all kids” fourth line Sunday that featured himself, Shane Wright, and Tye Kartye. Whether they stick together for Seattle’s game against the Avalanche remains to be seen, but it is an intriguing mix of young players that could bring a real spark against Colorado’s depth defensive units.
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.
Some nights, you just sense an ugly loss coming. Remember, when the Kraken fell to Calgary last Saturday, Nov. 4, the Flames came in on a six-game losing streak. They were desperate, as everyone knew they would be, yet Seattle lacked urgency that night. Against the Edmonton Oilers, who are on “fire their coach” watch and had lost eight of their previous nine games, it was more of the same. This time, a flat Kraken start led to an insurmountable 4-0 deficit after just 20 minutes.
“We didn’t push back and have that shift or that couple of shifts that you need to right the momentum and push back,” said coach Dave Hakstol.
Sure, the pushback (sort of) came in the third, but down four goals, Seattle didn’t give itself a real chance in this one.
It’s never fun to watch these kinds of games that go sideways early. Here are our Three Takeaways from an ugly 4-1 Kraken loss to the Oilers.
Takeaway #1 (Curtis): Net-front defense collapsed in first period
It appeared the Kraken started the game with enough energy to match Edmonton. When Eeli Tolvanen set up Yanni Gourde at 3:45 in the first period for the first Grade-A chance of the game, it looked like Seattle had Edmonton’s forecheck measured and was a step ahead.
The Kraken were knocked on the back foot when a poor pinch by Justin Schultz at 8:40 in the first period allowed an odd-man Edmonton rush that culminated in a spectacular backhand, top-shelf goal by Zach Hyman. Still, given Edmonton’s struggles, a 1-0 deficit seemed fine at the time.
What happened next stunned the team–not to mention the crowd assembled at Climate Pledge Arena. A series of defensive coverage failures directly in front of the Kraken goal ballooned the one-goal deficit to a 4-0 score at the end of the first period.
On each play, one or more Kraken players could have and should have done more to clear the lane or cover their assignments. At 14:09 in the first, on the penalty kill Hyman had far too much time unchecked to gather a rebound off a point shot at the top of the crease and snap the puck past Philipp Grubauer.
The Kraken’s penalty kill scheme (the “box” defense) often leaves the net-front player “assigned” to the goalie for coverage, but both Adam Larsson and Jamie Oleksiak should have been able to collapse on Hyman in this sequence to prevent, or at least alter, the shot. Oleksiak in particular seemed to drift too far.
A little over four minutes later, soft coverage allowed a net drive by Ryan Nugent-Hopkins that culminated in (as John Forslund would say) “hack and whack time” by “a bevy of humanity” in front of the goal. Grubauer never was able to grab hold of the puck and freeze it. In this situation, you often see a collapsing defense check through the bodies of the attacking forwards to neutralize any chance for a shot on goal. The Kraken failed to do this, instead content to engage in 50-50 stick battles. Hyman was the first to connect cleanly, and, in doing so, completed a natural hat trick for Edmonton.
Hakstol said he considered taking a timeout after this third goal but thought the team could survive the last 80 seconds of the first period and make adjustments at the intermission. But that didn’t happen.
With just 18 seconds left in the period, Dylan Holloway was left unchecked on the left side of the goal to corral a ricochet off the end boards and tap the puck behind Grubauer. Both Brian Dumoulin and Justin Schultz found themselves on the left side of the net, leaving the right post open. Schultz likely erred in straying out of position.
Matty Beniers also made a mistake here, though. After correctly shifting down to cover Holloway initially, he peeled away, either assuming a defenseman could shift back or thinking the puck was getting past the Edmonton forward. This left Holloway open to score.
Grubauer may take some heat coming out of this one, having allowed four goals on 17 shots before getting lifted, but it is clear he didn’t get any help from the net-front defense. Indeed, the Kraken’s lack of physicality and defensive detail clearly still stung Hakstol post-game.
“Soon as we gave up the first one… there’s three [more] goals scored at the net front,” Hakstol said. “We’ve got to take it upon ourselves defensively and competitively that that can’t happen.”
Takeaway #2 (Darren): The Zach Hyman show
Spin zone! The Kraken didn’t allow any points to Leon Draisaitl or Connor McDavid in this game. They also didn’t allow a single shot on goal in the third period and won that final frame 1-0. That’s pretty good, right?
Just kidding, I won’t try to spin this loss into anything positive, because it was a stinker, plain and simple. While Seattle was holding Draisaitl and McDavid off the board, Hyman was lighting it up and had singlehandedly given Edmonton a 3-0 lead by the 18:40 mark of the first.
As Curtis mentioned, Hyman did a great job of getting to the front of the net, and Seattle kept failing to account for him.
Hyman had a pretty simple explanation for his approach after the game. “If you look at any analytics numbers, they’ll tell you where most of the goals are scored,” Hyman said. “I don’t know if it’s like 50 percent, or something like that, where it’s within a five-meter radius of the net. So [I was] taught at a young age, if you want to score, go to the net.”
The Kraken do have a guy who has played with that mentality this season, and it’s Jaden Schwartz, who coincidentally scored for the fourth game in a row Saturday and extended his point streak to nine games. Schwartz has been all over the top of the blue paint this season, and his power-play goal against the Oilers came off a pass to that spot from Tolvanen.
As several Seattle players continue to struggle at producing consistent offense, a good place for them to go to break out just might be that area at the top of the crease.
Takeaway #3 (Darren): Bad night for Grubauer
Curtis was right in Takeaway #1 that Grubauer did not get a lot of help in that godforsaken first period, and the only goal I would hang much blame on him for was the Holloway goal. On that one, Grubauer had a chance to deflect the puck out of harm’s way, but it rolled off his stick blade and into the slot, breathing life into the play.
If you think about the others, one’s a two-on-one, one is a rebound after a shot through traffic with nobody clearing out Hyman, and one is a net-front scramble after Grubauer got knocked out of position by Kane (Seattle probably should have challenged that one, by the way).
Still, when a team comes out flat and gives up 17 shots in a period, it needs its goalie to find some pucks he’s not supposed to find. Although that has happened more nights than not for the Kraken this season, it just didn’t happen Saturday.
Statistically, it was Grubauer’s worst performance of the season by a long shot, and it was the first time he has been pulled from a game. His .762 save percentage was almost a full .100 worse than his previous low, which was the weird lighting game against the Rangers on Oct. 21. He also gave up two more goals than expected, according to Natural Stat Trick.
Joey Daccord was able to stop the bleeding in the second period and didn’t face any shots in the third. It will be interesting to see where Hakstol turns Monday against the Avalanche. If Grubauer’s old team wasn’t the opponent, we would say without a shadow of a doubt that it will be Daccord. But Grubauer just won against Colorado on Thursday, and historically, he tends to play well against that club in general. We shall see.
By the way, Colorado lost 8-2 to St. Louis on Saturday. We aren’t sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing for the Kraken.
We don’t want to sound too hyperbolic, but we think that was one of those Kraken wins that will stick with us for a while. Aside from Seattle skating away with a last-minute 4-3 win over the Avalanche, there were storylines galore in this one, and we felt several adrenaline spikes while watching it.
Ryan Winterton made his NHL debut and looked very good. Shane Wright played his first game of the season with the Kraken and was fast and confident. Matty Beniers scored his first goal of the season and even did the “monkey off the back” celebration. Oliver Bjorkstrand scored two goals, including a late game-winner, in his first game back at Ball Arena after scoring two goals in Game 7 in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Vince Dunn, Eeli Tolvanen, Jamie Oleksiak, and others put their bodies in harm’s way in the closing moments of the game to solidify the win. Should we continue?
“There’s going to be some ebbs and flows in a hockey game,” said coach Dave Hakstol. “But ultimately, we showed great resiliency at the end of the game and found the game winner. It’s a great win.”
Here are our Three Takeaways from a big 4-3 Kraken win over the Avalanche.
Takeaway #1 (Curtis): Winterton shows off two-way skill in solid debut
Ryan Winterton, 20, made his NHL debut Thursday. It began auspiciously, with a no-bucket warm-up.
“I was pretty nervous for my first lap without my helmet on,” Winterton admitted after the game with a laugh. When did he know he’d be taking the ice without his helmet? “I go to my stall and there’s no helmet there, so you got to go out without one.”
By traditional counting stats, Winterton’s night was fairly quiet–Natural Stat Trick credited him with just two shot attempts (one on goal), one takeaway, one giveaway, and one hit in a team-low 7:01 time on ice.
But those stats don’t tell the whole story on the young forward’s night. From the moment he stepped foot on the ice, Winterton’s play consistently stood out; he generated a shot on goal on his very first shift.
“After my first shift everything started to calm down,” Winterton said. He settled into a game where he played fast and responsible two-way hockey. He diagnosed plays well, used his body to win battles, and got to the right spots on the ice to create opportunities for himself and others. At 9:12 of the first period, he converted defense into offense when he sprung Devin Shore on a breakaway with a tape-to-tape pass.
Later in the first period, effective play from Winterton and his linemates set up Seattle’s first goal. The fourth line hemmed in Colorado for a protracted defensive-zone shift, and when the Avalanche finally broke the pressure to center ice, they were slow to the bench, allowing a clean Kraken re-entry that led directly to Jaden Schwartz’s score.
All of these details contributed to excellent relative shot quality analytics. When Winterton was out there, Seattle generated 82.02 percent of the total expected goals. This was the second-best mark on the team.
Post-game, Hakstol said Winterton and Wright had “rock solid” outings. “Both showed poise. They looked like they were comfortable to me. The moment was definitely not too big [for them].”
Winterton’s overall takeaway on his first game? “It was pretty surreal, to be honest.”
The Kraken didn’t make it easy on themselves on this night, again temporarily blowing a two-goal lead, as has been commonplace for the team this season. But give credit to the Avalanche, who are a very good club and who feed off their home crowd well. Once Bjorkstrand scored to make it 2-0 at 4:29 of the second period, we had this hunch that a Colorado answer was coming.
Regardless of whether we are clairvoyant or simply observant, the hunch proved to be correct when Nathan MacKinnon passed to Bowen Byram on a two-on-one rush, and the Avs were suddenly back within one goal just 28 seconds after Bjorkstrand’s tally. From there, you knew it was going to be a tense contest the rest of the way.
Things reached a fever pitch when Valeri Nichushkin got his stick on a Devon Toews point shot and redirected it past Philipp Grubauer at 12:15 of the third period. That tied the game 3-3, and it seemed like the game was heading south for the Kraken.
But have no fear, Bjorkstrand is still here!
He snuck out from behind the net and cleaned up a Tolvanen rebound that happened to skitter right onto Bjorkstrand’s stick with 31 seconds left on the clock.
Oliver says "Please sir, can I have some more?" and gets his second of the game!
“We just stuck with it,” Bjorkstrand said. “We kept pounding it, and we were able to find a way to get that last goal, so it’s a good step for the team.”
It was a heroic night for Bjorkstrand, but he has been outstanding all season and is closing in on point-per-game status with six goals and six assists through 14 games.
“His numbers are starting to speak for themselves offensively,” Hakstol said. “But you know, over the last six, seven games, his 200-foot game is really rounding out. You see that night in and night out.”
Takeaway #3 (Darren): Matty magic is back
It was really hard to pick what should be our last Takeaway, but Beniers scoring his first goal of the season felt like an inflection point. The reigning Calder Trophy winner had his best game of the season to date Tuesday in Arizona and posted two assists that night. But he still had not found the back of the net on the season, prompting many (we are included in that group) to use phrases like “sophomore slump” and “gripping the stick too tightly.”
Matty had two of these looks last game and put both into the goalie's chest. He doesn't make the same mistake here, sniping past Prosvetov.
“It felt good… It felt great,” said Beniers, summing up the moment succinctly.
Beniers’s goal came on the power play at 11:35 of the second period and made it 3-1. He flew into the offensive zone to apply pressure on the forecheck and help Schwartz force a turnover. Then, he passed to Dunn at the point and raced back up to the blue line to make himself available for a return pass. Once he got the puck back, he started rolling downhill toward Prosvetov, but he smartly recognized that Colorado was giving him a lane to skate almost all the way down to the blue paint.
When Beniers finally pulled the trigger, he picked his spot just under Prosvetov’s glove, learning from his two similar looks against the Coyotes that ended up in Connor Ingram’s chest.
“I think I’ve had those chances in games past, and sometimes they just don’t go in,” Beniers said. “I was fortunate to get one in tonight.”
Matty was very impactful on this road trip and notched three points in two games. Do the floodgates open for him now?
—
Before we go, we want to wish Avalanche forward Artturi Lehkonen a speedy recovery. He slammed head-first into the boards in the second period after a nudge from Oleksiak threw off his balance in exactly the wrong way. It was one of those scary plays that you simply never want to see in a hockey game.
Though he required assistance getting to the bench and down the tunnel, we were relieved to see him get to his feet. Wishing him the very best.
What a fun episode this is! John and Darren are in Denver for Kraken versus Avalanche, but they also interviewed Chet Buchanan before Seattle’s game against Nashville last week. It is an insanely fun interview.
Also in this episode, the guys break down the Predators, Flames, and Coyotes games, then go Down on the Farm.
After the interview, they shift to segments, which this week feature:
The Seattle Kraken announced Wednesday afternoon they had recalled two young forwards from the Coachella Valley Firebirds of the AHL: Shane Wright, Seattle’s 2022 first-round pick, and Ryan Winterton, Seattle’s 2021 third-round pick. Wright logged only eight NHL games last season, while Winterton, if he were to play Thursday in Colorado, would be making his NHL debut.
These moves were a surprise until (later on Wednesday) Geoff Baker of the Seattle Timesreported that Kraken forward Jordan Eberle had suffered a deep laceration in his leg at Wednesday’s practice. Jaden Schwartz stepped on a puck and lost his balance, leading to the injury. Baker also reported that a second unnamed Kraken forward was dealing with an injury coming out of Tuesday’s game against the Coyotes that could affect that player’s ability to play Thursday night in Colorado.
As recounted by Baker, Kraken general manager Ron Francis expressed optimism that the team may have “dodged a bullet” with Eberle’s injury, but Seattle was awaiting official results from an MRI before reaching any conclusions on the duration of Eberle’s potential absence from the roster.
As for Thursday’s game, it sounds like one, or perhaps both, of Wright and Winterton should be out there. What else do we know? How do all the roster pieces fit together? Why were Wright and Winterton selected for recall? How long will they stay with the Kraken? Let’s dive into those questions and more.
Fitting the roster pieces together
It may come as a surprise that Seattle was able to add two new forwards to the roster, but the Kraken have been playing shorthanded and with open roster spots for a while.
The team began the season with only 22 roster players, one below the maximum roster size of 23. While teams often carry two extra forwards beyond the 12 forwards who may suit up in a game, Seattle started with only one–Tye Kartye.
In the time since the puck dropped on the season in Las Vegas, the Kraken have lost forwards Brandon Tanev and Andre Burakosvsky to injuries and placed both on injured reserve, opening their roster spots for a replacement. Before Wednesday, the team had recalled only Devin Shore from Coachella Valley as an injury replacement. This left Seattle with just 12 healthy forwards and two open roster spots.
When Eberle was hurt Wednesday–and another player’s injury apparently lingered–the team did not have any fill-ins ready on the roster. This prompted Seattle to recall players from Coachella Valley.
Since the team is not cap-constrained at the moment, Seattle had the option to recall any AHL forward on an NHL contract. Why did the team choose Wright and Winteron over more experienced forwards like John Hayden or Max McCormick who have logged games with Seattle in the past? Let’s take a look.
Wright and Winterton surging in Coachella Valley
The simplest answer is that both Wright, 19, and Winterton, 20, have been playing well and producing offense. Wright has tallied three goals and two assists in his last four AHL games, including an overtime game-winning goal on Oct. 29.
Wright’s total is second-most on the team in that four-game stretch, tied with Winterton’s identical total of three goals and two assists. Winterton is a rangy, skilled player, who has seen his development frustrated by injuries and a lost season when the OHL shut down due to the pandemic. When he’s been able to take the ice, he has been productive.
Wright could slide into Eberle’s role on the power play. He has been manning the wing on the Firebirds’ second power-play unit, looking for his perimeter shot. But Wright also has a feel for playing in the slot (where he often finds himself at five-on-five) and could move directly into Eberle’s bumper role.
For his part, Winterton brings special teams value too, having earned a role on the top penalty-killing unit in Coachella Valley. The Eberle injury aside, the penalty kill is likely a greater area of organizational need given the team’s struggles in this area recently.
Finally, it is worth noting that Wright and Winterton have spent significant ice time together in recent weeks and have found success playing off each other. This tandem dates back to Kraken training camp when they were often grouped with Tye Kartye. Could we see that line together again Thursday? It may be too inexperienced a grouping for the coaching staff’s liking, but we’ll learn more at Thursday’s morning skate.
What about the other options in Coachella Valley? Hayden is more of a bottom-of-the-lineup grinder at the NHL level. I suspect the team wanted for more offense if it is going to be without Eberle (and Burakovsky) for a stretch of time.
McCormick is the only other Firebird who was producing offense at a higher rate than Wright and Winterton over the last couple weeks, but I suspect the Kraken would prefer to leave their AHL captain in place unless it’s a long-term or near-permanent change.
Wright and Winterton’s recall may be brief if one or both of the new injuries reported Wednesday aren’t long term and Brandon Tanev returns to the lineup in the coming weeks. Still, the recall is just reward and encouragement for two young players who have played well in the AHL.
Upward roster pressure has been missing this year
Seattle’s success last season was frequently ascribed to its depth of NHL-caliber forwards. The team deployed players like Ryan Donato, Morgan Geekie, or Daniel Sprong on the fourth line, and at times scratched one or more of those players due to their depth, but those players had the talent to score in bunches if matched against opposing depth units.
The internal competition for playing time was a big part of the story too. The players knew that if they let their pace or details slip even temporarily, they might be out of the lineup in favor of another player looking to take their spot.
Much of Seattle’s vaunted depth left in free agency, but still the team was poised to have strong internal competition for playing time on the eve of the opener in Vegas. One of Karyte or Kailer Yamamoto had to sit that night. Both are skilled players–not your average “healthy scratch”-type.
Unfortunately for the team, injuries struck immediately. Since that opening game the team has not had the same upward lineup pressure. If a player was struggling, there was no viable threat to substitute him out of the lineup.
The addition of Wright and Winterton may provide a jolt to the remaining roster players. Wright was a top draft pick, and Winterton comes with strong pedigree as well. If Wright and/or Winterton crack the lineup Thursday night, and play well, others struggling through laggard starts to the year will find themselves with new external motivation to pick up their play.
Shane Wright skates at Kraken Community Iceplex (Photo/Brian Liesse)
The return of ‘contract corner’
Digging deep into the minutiae of this transaction, Baker noted that Wright’s recall was on an “emergency” basis. What are the implications for Wright and the team of this designation? It turns out, not much. But I’ll explain how it works under the Collective Bargaining Agreement for those who are curious.
A team can recall a player on an “emergency” basis if it can show that it has fewer than 12 healthy forwards, six healthy defensemen, or two healthy goaltenders.
The immediate benefits to a team of an “emergency” recall as opposed to a “standard” recall relate to the salary cap–if the team is at the limit, there is some relief–and eligibility for waivers if a player is not waivers exempt–a player’s NHL time on an emergency recall, if fewer than 10 games or 30 days on the roster, will not count toward the requirement for the player to be placed on waivers again under a “standard” recall scenario.
Neither “benefit” of the emergency designation applies here. Seattle is not at the upper salary limit and Wright will remain waivers exempt no matter how many games he plays with Seattle this season. So, there is no obvious rationale (in any remotely probable scenario) for using the emergency designation on Wright, aside from the fact that the team can use the designation and there is no downside to it.
Curtis Isacke
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.
The Kraken fell to the Arizona Coyotes 4-3 in a shootout Tuesday. They have dropped their last six games that ended in shootouts, and in this one, Oliver Bjorkstrand, Matty Beniers, and Jordan Eberle couldn’t find a way to get one across the line. Joey Daccord stopped two of three attempts on the other end, but Nick Bjugstad’s shootout tally was the game-winner.
The Kraken scored early, just 40 seconds into the game, when Eeli Tolvanen and Yanni Gourde executed a rare two-man breakaway to perfection.
🚨 GOAL-vanen! 2-on-0 break with Yanni Gourde leads to a tap in goal for Eeli Tolvanen 40 seconds in.#SeaKraken lead 1-0 early. pic.twitter.com/W7gIZvMKt6
After that it was a familiar refrain for the Kraken. Having built the lead, they gave it away.
“We gave up two on the [penalty kill] and ultimately that didn’t allow us to hold the lead. But it was a back-and-forth type of game,” Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said postgame.
Here are our Three Takeaways on this loss in Tempe, Arizona.
Takeaway #1 (Curtis): Seattle had the edge when it could keep five skaters on the ice
Hakstol indicated before the game that he was looking for the team to play with improved pace following a lackluster effort at home Saturday at home against Calgary. After watching his team’s effort, he seemed encouraged with the response he saw. “Real hard effort. Guys played hard throughout,” he said. “We played a full sixty-five minutes tonight.”
When Seattle was able to keep five skaters on the ice, the team played a fast, forechecking style that held Arizona down. “We used our legs well, we forechecked well,” Jamie Oleksiak said of the team’s five-on-five play. “We didn’t try to get too fancy with the puck. We used our speed to our advantage.”
Seattle outscored Arizona 2-1 in five-on-five situations. In addition to the Tolvanen goal in the first period, Justin Schultz scored on a pinpoint wrist shot from the top of the right-wing circle off a feed from Beniers in the second period.
This five-on-five advantage was fully earned by the shot quality the team was able to generate. According to Natural Stat Trick, the Kraken generated 58.82 percent of total shot quality in normal manpower situations.
The Schwartz-Wennberg-Eberle forward line, in particular, stifled the Coyotes at five-on-five. That unit gave up just one low-danger shot attempt against Joey Daccord, while creating 11 shot attempts on Connor Ingram, including two high-danger attempts. All in, the line generated an astounding 97.26 percent of total on-ice shot quality in almost ten minutes of five-on-five time.
The Kraken were less successful in reduced manpower situations, however. During 4:00 of four-on-four play during regulation and then 5:00 of three-on-three during overtime, Arizona found space to use their skill game, dominated possession, and seemed to have Seattle on the ropes at times. While Arizona wasn’t able to capitalize with a goal in these situations, they effectively suppressed Seattle’s offensive chances and pushed the game to a shootout where the Coyotes capitalized.
Takeaway #2 (John): Penalty kill continues to struggle
I mentioned it in my Monday Musings this week, but the penalty kill has been a big struggle for the Kraken in recent weeks, and that continued Tuesday; Arizona continued on two of their four power plays. Since the Detroit Red Wings game on Oct. 24, the Kraken have killed just 52 percent of their penalties. The league average in that span is 79 percent.
I rewatched every penalty kill from this Coyotes game, and the only observation I could make is they are not winning the 50/50 pucks often enough to clear the zone and kill time. There were several moments where the Coyotes would get off a shot attempt and reclaim the puck for more zone time.
Another contributing factor is Seattle’s face-off percentage on the penalty kill. For the season, they are around league average at 45.3 percent, but over the last five games they are at 20 percent. Losing the face-off enables opposing teams to have more zone time, which will ultimately lead to more shots and goals.
I don’t think it will solve the penalty kill issue, but help might be on the way in the form of Brandon Tanev who has been sidelined with a lower-body injury since opening night. He is on this road trip and participated in morning skate with the club in Arizona. Tanev was the Kraken’s leading forward in penalty kill time last season, and his speed might add a dynamic to opposing teams’ defense pinching in on 50/50 pucks.
Takeaway #3 (Darren): Matty’s best game of the season
I need to first address my colleagues here before I really get into my Takeaway from this game.
John, those stats about the PK are staggering. The team got off to such a hot start in that area, and things have really regressed. On Tuesday, it was interesting to see Seattle get cooked by the exact same play executed by the same two players twice. On both of Arizona’s power-play goals, Clayton Keller and Nick Schmaltz did a simple give-and-go play between Keller on the right hash and Schmaltz in the high slot. Keller was the trigger man both times, and both times, it ended up in Seattle’s net (though Barrett Hayton got a piece of the first one to earn credit for the goal). I would love to see A.) the Kraken figure out how to defend this play, though it is tough with a good shooter in the bumper spot, since you have to respect Schmaltz there. And B.) the Kraken take a page out of Arizona’s book and use that play on their own manpower advantages.
Curtis, you mentioned in an offline conversation (sorry to put you on blast here) that you thought Matty Beniers looked a bit lost in this game, aside from his two assists. I would disagree with you on that, which brings me to my actual Takeaway.
From what I saw, this was Matty’s best game of the season so far by a long shot. I think because he has been struggling so mightily, I was hyper focused on him throughout this game, and every time I saw him on the ice, he made a play that I liked. There were a few mishandles and one bad turnover in the offensive zone that thankfully didn’t bite the Kraken. But, he made two good offensive plays that turned into goals, he had a breakaway opportunity late in the game, and he had two great looks from the left circle. Both of those he unfortunately put into Ingram’s chest, but still, the looks were there, and his hustle was constant.
We often hear slumping players say they only get concerned when the chances dry up. Matty had a lot more chances in Tuesday’s game than he has in past games this season, and that’s a sign that goals will start going in for him soon.
Last week, I mentioned that if the Kraken were to get four out of a possible six points from the three games between then and now, it would resemble a playoff team. They got four out of six points by beating Tampa Bay and Nashville and losing to Calgary. So why do I feel so icky and bummed about the Kraken right now? Recency bias.
Recency bias gives “greater importance to the most recent event” that often misleads us into overweighting the most recent events when determining the long-term outlook for future events. This happens in positive and negative scenarios. Right now, we have a bad taste in our mouths from the team’s performance against the Flames on Saturday.
Let’s acknowledge the good over the last week. The Kraken got a big win against a very good Tampa Bay Lightning team last Monday that marked the first win in franchise history against that club. They then beat Nashville on Thursday night at home. That was a bit of a redemption game after losing to the Predators back on Oct. 12, which – up until Saturday night – was the worst they played all season.
What’s up with Matty?
The short answer is that I don’t know. I hate the expression, since I feel it is something that hockey media makes up to create a narrative, but he could be “gripping the stick too tightly” right now. The last couple games, it feels like he is not playing with the same confidence we saw last year. There are times where seems to be passing instead of creating a shooting lane for himself, and other times where he is finding space to create a shooting option but misfires the shot.
I’ve seen him out on the power play, but I am not noticing him as a scoring threat or even a key part of the power play right now. He is third on the Kraken in total power-play time this season with 31:27 of ice time, but he only has three shots on goal. Conversely, Andre Burakovsky, who has been out since Oct. 21, has less than half that time as Matty with the same number of power-play shots. This could be by design in how the power play is structured, but Beniers has been largely unnoticeable.
It could also be that opposing teams know him a little better this season and know how to make his life difficult, or it could be some self-inflicted pressure he is putting on himself. No matter what it is, I know he will get through it and will be fine. Slumps happen, and they probably happen more often to young players in this league than we even know. I keep wishing for some kind of fluky, ugly goal to help him break out of this funk.
Other Kraken musings:
Jaden Schwartz has been playing excellent this season, but I think Oliver Bjorkstrand has been the best player over the last five games or so. Both Schwartz and Bjorkstrand have 10 points on the season and have shown up at critical times in games.
Bjorkstrand scored his fourth goal of the season on Saturday night. He did not score his fourth goal last season until Dec. 22.
Beniers has yet to score this season; last season he had five goals by Nov. 5.
I don’t know who needs to hear this, but the Kraken rank eighth in the league in power play percentage at 25.7 percent, despite how ice cold (1 for 11) the power play was to start the season. The Kraken have at least one power-play goal in each of their last three games.
The Coachella Valley Firebirds are 5-2-0 on the season after winning four straight games. It has been a total team effort; they have 15 different goal scorers this season.
Shane Wright and Max McCormick lead the Firebirds with four goals apiece.
In just their second season, the Firebirds have the largest season ticket base in the AHL. It’s a remarkable achievement and testament to the leadership at Oak View Group. OVG has raised the bar in how to launch a franchise, both at the NHL level and now the AHL level. I often wonder if that is why we are starting to hear more expansion talk around the NHL.
Niklas Kokko, one of the Kraken’s second-round selections from 2022 NHL Entry Draft, is currently leading the Finnish Liiga in save percentage. He earned his first career shutout last week. Kokko is expected to be the primary goalie for Finland in the World Junior Championship at the end of December.
It was pretty cool to see “marathoner” Zdeno Chara run his second marathon of the year. On Sunday, he completed the New York Marathon in 3:19:19, which is an improvement on his Boston Marathon time of 3:38:23 in April. Congrats Big Z.
After injuring his shoulder in the World Championships last summer, free agent defenseman Ethan Bear is getting close to being fully rehabilitated and is destined for an NHL contract. He probably isn’t a fit for the Kraken, but I am excited to see this former Seattle Thunderbird back in the NHL.
Player performance
Jani Nyman (Ilves/SEA) – Playing for Ilves in the Finnish Liiga, Nyman had two goals in Ilves’ 6-4 victory over Sport on Saturday night. Nyman is currently donning the Red Bull helmet as the top U20 goal scorer in the league. He now has eight goals and five assists in 19 games for Ilves.
🙌😻 JAMPPA
Ilves siirtyi Vaasassa kahden maalin karkumatkalle tällä Jani Nymanin kauden seitsemännellä osumalla! 🚨
Ryan Winterton (CVF/SEA) – The third-round selection of the 2021 NHL Entry Draft for the Kraken has three goals and five points in his last four games. This is Winterton’s first season of professional hockey after playing in the OHL the last few seasons.
Justin Schultz (SEA) – Has four assists over the last three games including two power-play assists. He has been a significant contributor to the success of the Kraken power play as of late.
Chart of the week
The Kraken have uncharacteristically scored first in most of their games this season, which is usually closely aligned with winning. But the Kraken have won just 25 percent of the games in which they’ve scored first. The league average is 65 percent, so I expect that percentage to improve now that the team is scoring more. In the meantime, it has been an odd statistic through the first 12 games of the season.
Goal of the week
I had a hard time deciding between these two, so I’m picking two goals of the week:
BJORK-JAM! 🚨
Oliver goes BarrDown Studios for a power-play goal! What a shot.
The Kraken hit the road for a quick two-game set starting with the Arizona Coyotes on Tuesday, and then on to Denver to face the Colorado Avalanche on Thursday. The Coyotes are not the pushover we have seen the last few years, and Colorado really took it to the Kraken in a 4-1 win in Seattle’s home opener.
Seattle then returns home next Saturday with a game against a reeling Edmonton Oilers club. Getting four out of a possible six points will again be great, but three would be fine. It is another cliché, but I am looking for a full 60-minute effort in these games. I don’t think we’ve seen one yet, and a full 60 was the theme when the team went streaking last season.
One area where the Kraken must improve is the penalty kill. They have a 73 percent kill rate over the season after not allowing a power-play goal through the first four games. Over the last two weeks, they have a league-worst PK success rate at just 52.9 percent. That is brutally low, and they’ve got no chance at qualifying for the playoffs if they do not turn that around soon. This brief road trip would be a great place to rekindle that early-season magic.
As always, let me know your thoughts, questions, or areas you want me to investigate.
Finally, I want to give a big thank you to our Patreon members. We have a long way to go to be fully sustainable, but the support we have received to date confirms people appreciate our work and want to help it continue and grow.
The Kraken lost 6-3 to the Calgary Flames Saturday in an uncharacteristically poor effort. We’ve seen them lose in a lot of ways, but they don’t typically get outhustled, and that seemed to happen for a long stretch against a down-on-its-luck Flames team that had lost six in a row coming in.
Mikael Backlund gets the loose puck after Grubauer had made a breakaway save on Greer but couldn't find the puck to cover it. pic.twitter.com/QTtM0KmZXQ
“I feel like maybe they were more desperate than us,” said Pierre-Edouard Bellemare. “I think hungrier, won some battles, and it got away.”
Even through a sloppy middle period, in which the Kraken fired a measly three shots at Flames goalie Dan Vladar, it still felt like Seattle would come out victorious against its struggling opponent. But Noah Hanifin’s power-play goal late in that second period put the game in doubt, and the third period went sideways quickly.
Here are our Three Takeaways from a 6-3 Kraken loss to the Flames.
Takeaway #1: Cheap shot by Mangiapane had big impact
Moments after Vladar made his biggest save of the game, sprawling to rob Alex Wennberg on what looked like a sure goal, Andrew Mangiapane took a cheap shot at Jared McCann. McCann had slid to block Mangiapane’s shot and was lying in a prone position on the puck. Mangiapane inexplicably cross-checked McCann across the back of the neck, smashing the star forward’s face into the ice and drawing blood.
McCann saves a goal, and Mangiapane cross checks his face into the ice.
Mangiapane has been assessed a match penalty for attempt to injure. He's out of the game, and #SeaKraken have a 5-minute power play. pic.twitter.com/tV5LLzG9Xk
Mangiapane was assessed a five-minute major for cross-checking and a match penalty for intent to injure, removing him from the game.
1:11 into the power play, Oliver Bjorkstrand scored a nearly identical goal to the one he scored Thursday against Nashville, again sniping from the top of the right circle over Vladar’s glove. That gave the Kraken a 1-0 lead with nearly four minutes of power-play time left.
BJORK-JAM! 🚨
That's one way to make a team pay for a dirty hit.
Seattle failed to score for the rest of the major penalty, though, and just 14 seconds after it expired, Martin Pospisil—who had been serving Mangiapane’s penalty—scored on his first NHL shot in his first NHL game after a three-on-two rush.
The goal by Bjorkstrand was nice, but if Seattle could have gotten a second one there, this is probably a different story. Heck, even just keeping Calgary from scoring seconds after the penalty ended may have done the trick.
McCann left the game for a while after the cheap shot, but he did return and played the remainder. We will be curious to see what supplementary discipline comes for Mangiapane.
Also, worth noting, there was no physical response from Seattle after that incident, which is becoming a pattern with this year’s team.
Takeaway #2: Second-period PPG turned the tide
The Kraken had a bad second period by every metric. It isn’t surprising to see Calgary had 70 percent of the shot quality in the frame, especially when you remember that Seattle only shot on goal three times. The share of shot quality would have been tilted even farther in the Flames’ favor, except Tye Kartye had a great look before getting blasted into the boards by Nikita Zadorov.
Kartye gets stopped by Vladar after a nice setup by Shore. Then Kartye gets BLASTED into the boards by Zadorov.
“We weren’t breaking out clean, we weren’t on the forecheck as a five-man unit,” said Justin Schultz. “Just kind of chasing it a lot in the second, and we couldn’t really recover from that.”
Even so, the Kraken were ahead 2-1 and nearly escaped the period with their lead intact. But Eeli Tolvanen and McCann took back-to-back penalties, giving Calgary 46 seconds of five-on-three time, then another 1:14 at five-on-four. The Kraken came within one second of killing off both penalties, but Hanifin’s shot through traffic squeezed through the wickets on Grubauer to make it 2-2 with just one minute left in the second.
“There’s not one singular turning point,” Hakstol said. “But, I mean the obvious one is we work our way through the five-on-three, and you get towards the end of the PK, but ultimately… that changes the complexion of the entire game and obviously changes what the result of the second period is.”
The ugly second frame carried into the start of the third for Seattle, and Yegor Sharangovich put Calgary ahead with a high tip at 1:33. The Flames never relinquished the lead from there.
Hakstol said, “I didn’t think we got lulled into a trap, I thought we got outhustled in the first 10 minutes of the third period, plain and simple.”
Takeaway #3: Not good enough
These games happen, so we’re trying not to overreact here. The Flames saw an opportunity building in the second period to snap their embarrassing losing streak, and they took advantage of a Kraken team that wasn’t relentless enough.
We saw a few games like this last season when the Kraken had gotten a smidge too comfortable with their position in the standings and let winnable games slip through their tentacles. But they’re also not in a position right now—at 4-6-2 on the season—to be taking any team for granted, especially a Calgary club that has dominated Seattle over three seasons (the Kraken are now 1-7-0 all time against Calgary).
We still think the Kraken are close to going on one of their runs like last season, ripping off a bunch of wins in a row, but this game was a step in the wrong direction. Hopefully it’s a case of two steps forward and one step back, and this loss can motivate the club to now take a bunch of steps forward.
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.
As the Seattle Kraken prepared to take on the struggling Calgary Flames Saturday, line rushes at their morning skate looked familiar to what we’ve seen over the past week. Assuming nothing changes between practice and game time, this will be the third game in a row coach Dave Hakstol has trotted out the exact same lineup, dating back to the team’s road-trip-closing overtime win against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Oct. 30.
Seattle got off to a slow start to its season, going 1-4-1 in its first six games. Its lineup has been shuffled several times since then partly out of necessity (Brandon Tanev and Andre Burakovsky each got injured in those first two weeks) and partly because Hakstol wasn’t seeing results from groups that were so successful together last season.
The Kraken have started to find success, going 3-1-1 in their last five games, and it seems their line shuffling is settled… for now.
“You come out of wins, you come out of games where you find ways to get points as a group, you’re pretty cautious to make changes,” Hakstol said. “Now, that doesn’t mean we can’t do it, but we’ve liked some of the combinations.”
What’s working?
The forward mix Seattle has gone with the last two games (and will stick with Saturday against the Flames) has looked like this:
Tye Kartye – Matty Beniers – Oliver Bjorkstrand Jaden Schwartz – Alex Wennberg – Jordan Eberle Jared McCann – Yanni Gourde – Eeli Tolvanen Devin Shore – Pierre-Edouard Bellemare – Kailer Yamamoto
When the Kraken started their recent four-game road trip in Detroit, everything looked identical to the above, except Eberle and Bjorkstrand were flipped. With Burakovsky out of the lineup, Eberle skated alongside the two youngsters with whom he found success in last season’s Stanley Cup Playoffs. But the last tweak to the lines came when Bjorkstrand and Eberle traded spots, and things have gone swimmingly for Seattle since that minor change.
“We’ve won a few games, so it seems to be working,” Bjorkstrand said. “We obviously had a slow start, so we’re trying to find a little bit of something that’s working, but I think it looks good. I think we have a lot of combinations that could work.”
The Kraken started the season with forward combinations that were practically etched in stone for long stretches of last season, especially McCann, Beniers, and Eberle playing together on the top line, and Tolvanen, Gourde, and Bjorkstrand making up the third line. But Hakstol recognized those groups didn’t have the same mojo in the early stages of the current campaign, so he quickly recalibrated.
Hakstol said, “When you look at Gourdie, McCann and Tolvi, right? We know that Gourdie and Tolvi have great chemistry. Jared McCann has fit in well there. I thought Matty Beniers had a real good hockey game the other night [against Nashville], and Ollie Bjorkstrand was a part of that. So that group showed a little bit of chemistry together.”
Plenty of depth
The Kraken have enough skilled players that Hakstol can sprinkle them up and down the lineup, even with a guy like Burakovsky out long term, and that depth creates mismatches for some of Seattle’s top players. How can an opponent properly match up against a 40-goal scorer in McCann skating on the team’s third line? As we’re seeing lately, it’s a tall task for opposing coaches to answer that question.
“We have a lot of guys who can score goals and create chemistry with anybody,” said McCann. “And I’m playing with two guys that– I know what they’re gonna do, meat-and-potatoes kinds of guys that just focus on what makes them successful. And I feel like that’s what I was kind of missing at the beginning of the year. I was just trying to make things a little complicated. Getting back to watching guys like Yanni and Tolvi play that way just helps my game.”
Gourde has liked what he’s seen from all of Seattle’s top three lines lately. “This locker room, up and down the lineup, everybody can play different positions, and right now, it’s working that way, and it’s fun to watch,” Gourde said. “And you see that Wennberg line has been really good, effective. That Beniers line, they’ve been staying on pucks, playing fast… and our line, I mean, we’ve just got to keep going and keep building and keep building that transition and rush and be a little bit better in our D-zone.”
Still a work in progress
Is this how the lines will remain for the rest of the season? Of course not. More injuries will happen, and Burakovsky and Tanev will eventually come back. But there are trios of forwards that have shown they can work well together when things get shaken up again.
“It’s never going to be the right mix,” Gourde said. “It can change on a daily basis; it’s not something that is anchored in and that’s going to stay.”
Hakstol does seem confident in the group as it stands, though, and he’s also cognizant of the harmful effects too much line juggling can have on a team.
“One of the things you have to be careful with is it’s not always a line combination that’s not working,” Hakstol said. “So sometimes it’s about giving guys a little bit of time, rather than switching things up every two or three days and not allowing guys to get any comfort together at all. So there’s a fine line there.”
Lifting up slumping goal scorers
There are three forwards in the Kraken lineup—Jordan Eberle, Matty Beniers, and Eeli Tolvanen—that have struggled to find the offensive prowess they each showed last season. Those three have combined for just two goals this season, and Beniers, the reigning Calder Trophy winner, remains goalless.
We do not think it’s a coincidence that none of those three are on a line together currently. Instead, Tolvanen is now playing with the team’s top goal scorer in McCann, Beniers is with Bjorkstrand, who has had a solid all-around start to the season, and Eberle is playing with Schwartz, who has been Seattle’s most consistent player so far. Eventually, the goals being scored by others should rub off on Eberle, Beniers, and Tolvanen.
Asked specifically about Beniers, Hakstol thinks he’ll get the monkey off his back soon.
“One’s going to bounce in for him,” Hakstol said. “Whether he shoots it in the net or it bounces in off his ass, one’s going to go in sooner or later. And when it does, that’s going to loosen him up a little bit offensively.”
Other tidbits – Gourde testing neck guard
A big topic around the hockey world lately has been the use of neck guards, after Adam Johnson was tragically killed playing in a game for the Nottingham Panthers of the EIHL. In the wake of that horrifying incident, a handful of players around the NHL have been seen wearing protective equipment around the throat area.
Gourde was the first Kraken player to be seen wearing one Saturday.
“We all know what happened, and I think we’re testing some stuff out here to see how it feels,” Gourde said. “Protecting yourself is probably the biggest answer for [why I was wearing it].”
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 Kraken might be finding their mojo. Thursday’s 4-2 win against the Nashville Predators felt like so many of the games from the 2022-23 campaign. It was common last season for Seattle to get in a position where it badly needed to score a goal, and lo and behold, some unexpected hero would step up with the clutch goal.
Thursday, it was Brian Dumoulin who came up with a massive response goal at 16:58 of the second period, just 24 seconds after Roman Josi had tied it for Nashville. Couple that goal with Philipp Grubauer’s play to close out the frame (Grubauer took a rare penalty to make things more difficult on himself, but he came up huge in those closing minutes of the second), and the Predators’ momentum was completely sapped.
The Kraken are now 3-1-1 in their last five games. Are they getting on a roll?
Here are our Three Takeaways from a 4-2 Kraken win over the Predators.
Takeaway #1 (Darren): A big game for Grubi
Grubauer continued Seattle’s run of strong goaltending Thursday, earning his second win in as many tries. The consecutive victories have to feel good for the German Gentleman, who played well in his first four starts but got almost no goal support in those outings and took L’s in all four.
What has been really encouraging from Grubauer is that he hasn’t been giving up the early goals that have plagued long swaths of his tenure in Seattle. In years one and two, it was a regular occurrence for him to give up a goal on one of the first five (or so) shots of the game, leaving the Kraken chasing from the jump. With Seattle very much struggling to find its legs in its first game back after a long road trip, Grubauer was sharp from the opening face-off against Nashville.
“You can’t control what’s coming at you,” Grubauer said of his approach to starting games. “If it’s a breakaway for the first shot or a fluffy from the red line, stop everything, right? That’s the mentality.”
Grubauer is playing aggressively, but when he gets outside the blue paint and gives up a rebound, he is reading the play and recovering quickly enough to slide and cover the follow-up shots as well. I recall a sequence in the second period (I can’t find video of it in the highlights, so this won’t be a great description) when Grubauer made a save to his right, then made a big push with his left skate and stopped a second shot from a bad angle. When he stopped the second one, he was a solid three feet outside his crease but was perfectly aligned to make the save. He recognized that as soon as the puck came off him, he needed to get repositioned in a hurry. It’s like he knows right where the play is heading even before it gets there.
Of course, his best save of the night came when Jaden Schwartz was in the box serving Grubauer’s own tripping penalty, just the second penalty of his career. Gustav Nyquist shot off Grubauer’s blocker, but the rebound went right onto the tape of Tommy Novak for what looked like Novak’s second power-play goal of the game. But Grubauer did a full split and got the toe of his right skate on the second opportunity, robbing Novak and helping his mates kill off the penalty he took.
“Sometimes it’s kind of awkward not being able to sit in the box there by taking the penalty,” Grubauer said. “There’s a couple of huge blocks, and we need those. It doesn’t matter who takes the penalty, sitting in the box, you want to kill it off for that guy and for the team.”
Grubauer ended the night with 32 saves on 34 shots, 1.99 goals saved above expected, two penalty minutes, and he helped Nyquist find his teeth on the ice after Adam Larsson knocked them out with a high stick in the first period. That’s quite the night!
By the way, when asked if Grubauer was actually hurt on the play where he took his penalty or if he was just milking it to get some sympathy from the refs, Grubauer said, “Wouldn’t you like to know! Next question.”
Takeaway #2 (John): Momentum for the power play
The power play has continued to improve as this season has gone on, and the Kraken notched another power-play goal on four opportunities last night. The Kraken are currently eighth in the league with a 25 percent success rate and are clicking at 35.7 percent over the last five games.
BJORK-JAM! 🚨
Oliver goes BarrDown Studios for a power-play goal! What a shot.
It still feels like there are moments where this team is struggling to enter the zone cleanly, but when they get set up, they are really moving the puck well. They are creating more options this season for scoring chances, instead of relying so heavily on Jared McCann and Daniel Sprong (like they did last season) to skate down from the left circle.
The Kraken ranked 21st in the league on the power play last season, so it is still a bit early to say if their top-10 ranking this season is the new norm for the power play or just some early-season luck.
Takeaway #3 (Curtis): Brian Dumoulin finds his footing
Dumoulin’s transition into the Seattle lineup has not been without its challenges. He has suffered a few notable defensive gaffes, and he has looked a step slow at times–perhaps still processing his role and fit in the Kraken system. As recently as last Thursday at Carolina, he blew a tire in the defensive zone attempting to take a breakout pass from Joey Daccord, which led to a turnover and an immediate Hurricanes score in a one-goal overtime loss.
Dumoulin has quieted some concerns over the last two games, though, showing savvy offensive instincts and sound, shutdown defense. He scored his first goal of the season Monday at Tampa Bay on a play where he read the strong-side action well and creeped down from his blue line position on the weak side with perfect timing to corral a rebound and shoot it before netminder Jonas Johansson could recover. Beyond the goal, he was Seattle’s best defenseman that night by on-ice shot quality at five-on-five. As measured by Natural Stat Trick, Seattle generated 77.05 percent of total shot quality when he was out there.
On Thursday night, Dumoulin may have been even better. He found the back of the net again on another skilled play. The Biddeford, Maine, native took open ice in front of him before changing the angle of his shot and simultaneously using Predator forward Cole Smith as a screen.
“We knew that their forwards sink back a little bit and try to block shots instead of coming out hard on us,” Dumoulin said after the game. “So, I knew I’d have an extra second there to try to create a lane for myself. And [Tye Kartye] did a great job screening the goalie also.”
The goal marked the first time in Dumoulin’s career he has scored in back-to-back games. “It’s great to contribute,” Dumoulin said of his goal-scoring streak. “With this team, everybody’s got to contribute for us to win. We’ve done that here in this last stretch. We’ve gotten goals from different people, and it’s important.”
Thursday’s goal–which put Seattle up 3-2 and held up as the game-winner–came at a crucial point in the game. Nashville had tilted the ice in its direction for much of the second period before finally breaking through with the game-tying goal at 16:34 in the period. Dumoulin responded just 24 seconds later. By scoring, he effectively wiped away all of Nashville’s hard work and gave Seattle the jolt it needed to hang onto this win.
Dumoulin’s contributions didn’t stop there. Though Nashville outplayed Seattle (except for Philipp Grubauer) over long stretches, Seattle generated 74.74 percent of total shot quality when Dumoulin was on the ice at five-on-five. This led all skaters for Seattle.
For the season, Seattle is generating more than 55 percent of total shot quality when Dumoulin is on the ice in five-on-five scenarios. This is fourth overall and second best among defensemen on the team, only fractions of a point behind his defensive partner Justin Schultz. Of course, Dumoulin and Schultz are taking some easier matchups, but this was likely Seattle’s vision when it signed Dumoulin to a two-year deal this offseason; take a player who has played first-pair minutes, move him down the lineup, and see if his productivity bounces back against lesser competition.
It’s a long season, and the sample size is still quite small. But, as it stands in early November, Dumoulin seems to have found his footing. “Obviously when you contribute you feel like part of the team,” Dumoulin said. “[I’ve] just got to continue to try to do that.”
