Seattle SPORTs Now

  First, the bad news. The Seattle Kraken blew a two-goal lead for the third time in four games last night at Climate Pledge Arena. The good news- they’ve won all three games. In an opening month marked by wins in games that the Kraken might have lost in the first five years of their existence, Seattle’s Brandon Montour slapped home a shot with 33 seconds remaining past his old teammate Sergei Bobrovsky to give the Kraken a 5-4 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Kraken improve to 8-4-1 on the season and have yet to lose a game (6-0) where they’ve had a two-goal lead. The Maple Leafs are 7-6-2. Seattle never trailed in the contest but Toronto’s high-scoring star Auston Matthews tied the game with 1:30 left in regulation (``that’s just a goal scorer doing his thing,” said Kraken coach Lane Lambert.) No doubt the crowd, which included a fair amount of Maple Leaf fans, were gearing up for an overtime period. However, Montour had other ideas. He took a drop pass from Matt...

  Seattle Kraken entered last night’s contest with the Minnesota Wild off to their best start in the franchise’s six-year history with a 7-3-1 record. So, maybe they were due for a `clunker,’ or the Wild are just a very good team. Most likely it was a little bit of both, as the Kraken dropped a 5-1 decision to their visitors last night st Climate Pledge Arena. The loss ends the Kraken’s modest two-game winning streak. Defenseman Vince Dunn succinctly analyzed last night’s contest noting, “I think the first period wasn’t terrible,” said Dunn. “And then the second period, it just kind of collapses.” The Kraken actually had a pretty good first-period outshooting the Wild, 14-7, and taking a 1-1 tie to the intermission. But Minnesota (7-3-2) notched three-second period goals. Minnesota took a 1-0 lead, 16 seconds into the game, when their top player (and last night’s number-one star) Kirill Kaprizov went in on a breakaway, deked Kraken goalkeeper Joey Daccord, and slid the puck...

  To be honest, this was the type of game that the Seattle Kraken would lose in their first five years in the National Hockey League. The Kraken led the Detroit Red Wings, 3-0, last night at Climate Pledge Arena with 15 minutes remaining in the contest. But the visiting Wings rattled off three consecutive goals, including Alex DeBrincat’s marker with only 17 seconds showing on the clock. But after a typical five-minute overtime- both teams circling the offensive zone looking for the one perfect shot--the teams headed to a shootout. The shootout hasn’t been the Kraken’s friend through the years, but Bobby McMann tallied the go-ahead score and Philip Grubauer stopped Dylan Larkin at the other end to give the Kraken a 4-3 decision (Seattle’s Freddy Gaudreau and Detroit’s Victor Arvidsson also scored in the shootout.) ``Overall we played pretty well,’’ said Kraken coach Lane Lambert. ``Our first game back after a long road trip. We were focused.’’ The Kraken, who played seven o...

 Just like Dorothy in `The Wizard Of Oz,’ discovered she wasn’t in Kansas anymore, the Seattle Kraken discovered they weren’t playing the hapless Calgary Flames anymore. After besting the not very hot Flames, 6-1, in two of their first three regular season games, Seattle dropped a 6-2 decision to the Vegas Knights, last night at Climate Pledge Arena. The Kraken drop to 2-2 on the season, while the Knights, who advanced to the Stanley Cup finals last season, improve to 3-1. It may be the nature of hockey that Kraken fans were mostly in good spirits as they left the arena at games end. Many of the fans enjoyed a hectic, fight-filled, penalty-filled third period which was uncharacteristic of Seattle-Vegas games since the Kraken joined the league. Vegas rookie Marc Gatcomb may have set the tone for the game when he received a boarding penalty against Seattle defenseman Ryan Lindgren 15 seconds into the contest. Lindgren tried to play a couple of shifts but was scratched for the r...

  The Seattle Kraken home opener may have lacked the pre-game luster of some previous openers, but on the ice, this was surely the most impressive of any Kraken home debut. After splitting two road games, the Kraken defeated the Calgary Flames by a 6-1 margin for the second time this season. After topping the Flames- who appear headed for a run as the worst team in the NHL this season, the Kraken jumped out to a quick lead last night at Climate Pledge Arena. While not a sellout crowd, the fans in attendance were treated to three goals in the first seven minutes. First, Berkly Catton intercepted an errant pass in the Calgary zone and wristed one past Flames’ netminder Dustin Wolf at 2:22; Catton’s first goal of the season. Two minutes later, Mackie Samoskevich notched his first goal as a Kraken. A former University of Michigan teammate of the Kraken’s Matty Beniers, waited for Wolf to commit himself and then slid a backhander into the net. Samoskevich, known for his speed, ble...

  Seattle Kraken general manager Jason Botterill met with the local media Wednesday at the Kraken Practice Facility at Northgate and said he plans to be `very aggressive’ during the off-season. The Kraken looked headed towards a playoff berth until they weren’t. The team boasted a 10-5-2 record in the month of January where at one point they were only three points behind the top spot in the Pacific Division. On the year, Seattle was in a playoff spot for 117 days. But when the team returned from the Olympic break in February it appeared to be lacking a spark and fell all the way down to 13 th place in the16-team Western Conference. Ironically, the Pacific Division was relatively weak this season and a top three finish would have placed the Kraken in the playoffs regardless of point totals. ``Our power play dropped off in March and April,’’ said Botterill, as the team went through a 5-14 streak after the Olympics. ``I feel our future is bright, but we’re not where we want to ...

                                Ron Francis (above) with Jordan Eberle and his family After five years with the Seattle Kraken- four as general manager and one as president of hockey operations- Ron Francis and the Kraken have decided to part ways. In some ways, this has been the most disappointing season in the five-year history of the Kraken. At the Winter Olympic break, Seattle was in a playoff position in the Pacific Division. Since the season resumed, Seattle’s NHL entry has only won five of 19 games. -``No one is satisfied,’’ said Kraken CEO Tod Leiweke. ``We have not delivered on the promise of this team. We're going to go back to the model we started with. We're going to have a GM who makes the decisions." Francis has made the decisions since before the Kraken even had a nickname. He took over in July 2019 and selected the players in the 2021 NHL expansion draft. While the Kraken didn’t achieve...

  Hopes are high for the Seattle Mariners as the 2026 baseball season begins. The Mariners came within eight outs of a World Series trip a year ago and are a popular pick to make their first-ever Fall Classic appearance in 2026. Here’s how Seattle SPORTs Now looks at the season. AL West The Mariners should take the division this season anchored by arguably the best- starting rotations in baseball. Logan Gilbert and Bryan Woo are probably co-aces, but the back end of the rotation, Luis Castillo and Emerson Hancock were dominant in their first starts of the season. Emerson threw six no-hit innings on a nationally televised game against the Cleveland Guardians but in 21 st century baseball it was no surprise that Hancock was pulled after six innings. George Kirby and Bryan Miller, currently on the disabled list round out the starting rotation when Andre Munoz, the Mariners stud out of the bullpen. The Mariners big guns have yet to start hitting- outfielder Julio Rodrigues t...

  The long-awaited 2026 baseball season begins this week with Seattle Mariner fans having high expectations for the coming season. The M’s came within a game of making their first ever World Series in 2025 and are trendy pick to make-and possibly win- the Fall Classic this season. Will 50 be the magic number for the Mariners who begin their 50 th year of existence? Seattle returns most of last year’s squad and there’s cautious optimism that the team has made some improvements. Reigning home run champ Cal Raleigh returns along with the M’s highly regarded starting rotation except for number-five starter Bryce Miller who begins the season on the disabled list Emerson Hancock replaces him in the rotation for now. The rotation of Logan Gilbert- Thursday’s opening day starter against the Cleveland Guardians- Bryan Woo, a team-high 15 wins, George Kirby and Luis Castillo with Andre Munoz (38 saves) coming out of the bullpen is the jewel of baseball. Arguably, the rotation was bett...

  If you’ve watched the World Baseball Classic recently, there’s a player on the Canadian team who might seem familiar. Phillippe Aumont from Gatineau, Quebec was a number-one draft pick of the Seattle Mariners way back in 2007 (11 th overall), the third player in Canadian history to be taken that high in the amateur draft following Adam Loewen (Baltimore) and Jeff Francis (Colorado) in 2002. However, he never made it to the big club being dealt in one of those `we’ve got a shot to win this year’ deals in 2012. Aumont was dealt to the Phillies as part of a package for pitcher Cliff Lee, who the Mariners would soon deal away when they realized they didn’t have a shot to win that year. Aumont pitched parts of three seasons with the Phils chalking up a less than inspiring 1-6 record. He spent time in the Tigers, White Sox and Blue Jays organizations bunt never saw action in in the major leagues after leaving Philadelphia. Despite not having pitched in the majors since 2015 or...

In the first day of NFL free-agency the Seattle Seahawks lost Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker III, who signed a three-year $45 million deal with the Kansas City Chiefs. Also leaving the Seahawks are pass rusher Boye Mafe who’ll receive $60 mil. for three years from the Cincinnati Bengals and defensive back Cobe Bryant, who inked a three-year $40 million deal with the Chicago Bears. The Seahawks re-signed one player that day, cornerback Joshua Jobe. On paper, it appears that Maye and Bryant got better deals than Walker, who no doubt is the player Seahawk fans are most sorry to lose, but running backs, because of the physical beating they take, generally have much shorter careers (and are leading candidates to be permanently injured before a long-term contract would expire). Some good news for the Seahawk Nation was the resigning of wide receiver/kick return specialist Rashid Shaheed over the weekend who agreed to a three-year, $51 million contract to remain with the Se...

  Fresh off a USA women’s hockey victory in the 2026 Winter Olympics, Seattle set a new women’s hockey attendance record last Friday night at Climate Pledge Arena. A sellout crowd of 17,335 was on-hand to see a contest between the home town Torrent and the Toronto Sceptres (who posted a 5-2 victory). Not bad, considering the Torrent and the Sceptres are the bottom two teams in league standings. This marked the third time in four months that the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) has set a new attendance record. The Torrent previously set the record at their inaugural home opener against the Minnesota Frost on November 28, 2025 in front of 16,014 fans at Climate Pledge Arena. Then as part of the PWHL Takeover tour, a total of 17,228 fans filled Capital One Arena in Washington DC for a game between the Montreal Victoire and the New York Sirens. The Takeover Tour allows fans in cities without a PWHL franchise the opportunity to see the women’s game. Team USA and T...

  While Seattle hockey fans ponder why Nathan McKinnon never misses an open net when he plays against the Kraken, Seattle’s two pro hockey teams return home from the Winter Olympics this weekend. The Kraken (27-20-9, 63 points), currently third in the Pacific Division and in a playoff spot, play at Dallas, Wednesday and St. Louis, Thursday. They begin their longest home stand of the season on Saturday when they host their arch-rivals, the Vancouver Canucks. Despite having six players in the Olympics, including Team USA captain Hillary Knight, the Torrent currently reside in the cellar of the Professional Women’s Hockey League with a 4-1-2-7 record for 16 points (the PWH separates wins from overtime wins). The Torrent host the Toronto Sceptres on Saturday at Climate Pledge Arena. While the US men and women’s teams both defeated Canada, 2-1, in overtime to win gold medals, the women were dominant. The USA team outscored their opponents, 33-3, going 7-0 in the tournament. Torr...

  While still euphoric over the Seahawks’ Super Bowl victory, Seattle sports fans had more reasons to celebrate this weekend as NBA Commissioner Adam Silver left little doubt that Seattle and Las Vegas will be the next two cities to receive NBA expansion teams. Speaking at the league All-Star game in Inglewood, Cal., Silver said the league would be talking about expansion at their March meeting and that would open the door for approval from other owners sometime in the summer. Most importantly, Seattle and Las Vegas were the cities specifically mentioned. As far as what the league has to talk about, the first question would be who will be the owners of the new teams and certainly they would have to pay an expansion fee to join the league. David Bonderman was a co-founder of the Seattle Kraken along with Jerry Bruckheimer, and also a minority owner of the Boston Celtics. There was speculation that Bonderman would be involved in bringing an NBA back to Seattle- and the new team...

WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS For anyone who questions whether sporting events bring a city together, consider this. You could have walked the streets of Seattle, Sunday night, and yelled out `Sea,’ and chances are someone off in the distance would call back, `Hawks.’ That was the scene on Capitol Hill in Seattle where fans filed out of the numerous watering holes that were showing the Super Bowl to join in a mass celebration. There were chants, cheering, singing ``We Are The Champions,’’ and even fireworks going off in the distance. The Seattle Seahawks had just defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX (60), 29-13, in a game that seemed more one-sided than the final score would indicate. The Seahawks are now 2-2 in the country’s biggest sporting event, and avenged a loss to the Patriots back in 2015, XLIX (49), 28-24. Even the appearance of Malcolm Butler in pre-game ceremonies, who made the game clinching interception against Russell Wilson in that ill-fated Feb. 1, 2015 conte...

Welcome to the new and improved Seattle SPORTs Now. While there are several sites that provide game stories this is something new and different- a weekly newsletter that will focus on Seattle sports and whatever catches the attention of your author. Hope you enjoy it. Sam Darnold and the Super Bowl The year 2025 was a good year for Seattle sports fans. One month into 2026, it appears this could be an even better year. The Seattle Mariners dominated headlines in 2025, winning the American League Western Division and then advancing to the AL championship series against the Toronto Blue Jays. The M’s looked like they were headed to their first-ever World Series until they weren’t. Currently, the Seattle Seahawks are preparing for their first Super Bowl appearance since 2015. As anyone who hasn’t been living under a rock knows, the Seahawks are facing the same team they faced in 2015- the New England Patriots (and congrats if these were your picks to make the Super Bowl at the begi...