Kraken's weekend split

 

After their worst game of the regular season, a 6-1 home loss to the San Jose Sharks, the Seattle Kraken entered a tough weekend, facing two road opponents in two days.

The Kraken reverted to the way they’ve played most of the season, posting a 4-3 overtime victory against the St. Louis Blues on Saturday night, before coming up on the short end of a 2-1 decision to the Dallas Stars yesterday at American Airlines Center. The Kraken record now goes to 7-4-4 on the season.

Things didn’t look good for the Kraken when it was announced that Joey Daccord, who had started all but two games in the Seattle nets this season, was being placed on Injured reserve with an upper body injury. The team was already missing Jared McCann (the team’s all-time leading scorer) and Freddy Gaudreau with injuries.

That meant that Philipp Grubauer and Matt Murray, who had both started only one game this season, will man the nets for Seattle, at least until next weekend the earliest that Daccord, probably the Kraken’s best player this season, could come off the IR.

Grubauer earned the starting nod on Saturday and the struggling Blues (5-9-2) jumped out to a 2-0 first-period lead. However, the Kraken tied things in the second period off goals from Ryker Evans and Eeli Tolvanen, the first goal of the season for both skaters. Evans was playing his first game of the season coming back from an injury.

The Blues held a 3-2 lead in the final minutes of the third period. With Grubauer pulled for an extra attacker, Chandler Stephenson, off a pass from Matty Beniers, fired home the tying goal with 1.9 seconds remaining on the clock.

While the goal was clearly in time, the officials did review the play to see if Jordan Eberle, standing in front of the crease, had interfered with St. Louis goaltender Joel Hofer. After a brief review, the goal stood and the teams headed to a five-minute overtime period.

The Kraken, playing in their league high seventh extra session, scored at 1:57 when Shane Wright drove to the net for his fourth goal of the season. Tolvanen had the primary assist, giving him three points on the night. Grubauer finished with 16 saves on 19 shots.

The following night, Jaden Schwartz opened the scoring in the first period, when he tipped home a shot from defenseman Adam Larsson. But Wyatt Johnston and Tyler Seguin added first period goals and that score stood up the remainder of the game.

Murray, who played on two Stanley Cup winners with the Pittsburgh Penguins, had 22 saves in the contest. But Casey DeSmith, the Stars’ backup goalie to Jake Oettinger, was the star of the game with 30 stops, 15 in the second period.

While the Kraken split the weekend, they appeared to not have any lasting effects from their 6-1 thrashing to the Sharks last week.

``That was a good hockey game for us,” said Kraken coach Lane Lambert after last night’s contest. “We probably win that game nine times out of 10. Tonight wasn't the night. Their goaltender played very well. I thought everybody on our team made an impact for the most part.

“We had enough chances to win the hockey game. Our compete level was high. You’re going to have a few of those. We’ve got to find a way to bounce back. But there's no question that was one of our better games of the year.”

``Murray played really well,” said Schwartz. “He looked solid the whole game. He made some big saves to keep it to one [goal lead]. So very happy for him. He's been working hard. Both he and Grubi have been dialed in ... Credit to them. They've been working hard and doing what they need to do. It's not easy when you're not in game mode.”

The Kraken return to Climate Pledge Arena tomorrow night for a contest with the Columbus Blue Jackets, who will be playing their second game in two nights.