The Seattle Kraken and Minnesota Wild tallied a grand total of ten shots and no goals in the first period of the game on Thursday night; tight checking reminiscent of coach Jacques Lemaire’s years in St. Paul.
From there the bounces and play went the way of the Seattle Kraken, with the visitors going on to win 4-0.
The Goals:
2nd Period
1-0 Kraken – 5:02 – Morgan Geekie (4) from Daniel Sprong and Ryan Donato – Even Strength
A typically harmless shot from the right wing half-wall appeared to deflect in off Geekie’s stick and Wild defenseman Jared Spurgeon’s pants.
2-0 Kraken – 11:32 – Jamie Oleksiak (2) from Yanni Gourde and Justin Schultz – Even Strength
A bad line change by Minnesota helped lead to a 4-on-2 rush which Oleksiak finished from the right side of the slot with a redirect.
3-0 Kraken – 14:47 – Alexander Wennberg (2) from Sprong and Oliver Bjorkstrand – Power Play
A puck flipped up on the air over the head of Wennberg who was standing in front of the crease. He tried to head the puck towards the goal and initially fooled the ref’s by appearing to do so. The goal was waved off until under review it was determined that Wennberg had missed with his backwards heading attempt and the puck went in off his back.
3rd Period
4-0 Kraken – 10:35 – Alexander Wennberg (3) from Will Borgen – Even Strength
Wennberg with a perfect deflection of a Borgen low wrist shot from the point.
Tired Legs?
The Wild were playing their fifth game in eight nights and the idea was to play a road game at home. It didn’t appear to work. They mustered a push late in the second period but very little in the third.
Minnesota has four nights off before their next game, so the Kraken were fortunate in the scheduling of this one. These things happen in a crammed 82-game schedule and teams need to exploit the opportunities. The Kraken shut down the dual top-line threats of Kirill Kaprisov and Mats Zuccarello.
The Kraken power play went 1-for-2 while the penalty kill handled both Minnesota power play opportunities.
Kraken Three Stars
1) Martin Jones – Although there weren’t too many Grade-A chances, one must pony up for the 22-save shut-out.
2) Alexander Wennberg – Two goals including a nice tip and a puck in off a failed soccer move.
3) Daniel Sprong – The Dutch winger has made the most of his latest opportunity. His 2 assists tonight gives him 7 points in his last 5 games.
