Correcting Some Kraken
The Seattle Kraken have no reason to panic. After a day off Monday, they took a pragmatic approach to important issues that arose in Sunday’s overtime loss to the Winnipeg Jets.
“So the other night, in a game where we need to make it a four line game, we took a too-many-men-on-the-ice penalty 20 seconds or 30 seconds in, we took seven minor penalties throughout,” Kraken Head Coach Dave Hakstol pointed out. “You have the spotlight on the penalties, (and it) comes obviously on the (Carson) Soucy penalty. So we addressed that immediately after the game.”
Soucy took a retaliatory roughing penalty against Jets forward Pierre-Luc Dubois with 26-seconds remaining in regulation and the Kraken leading 2-1. With an empty net, an extra attacker, and the power play 6-on-4, the Jets tied the game with 5.2 seconds remaining and would go on to win it 54-seconds into overtime.
“We addressed a piece of our overtime play immediately after the game,” Hakstol added.
The focus was on shorter shifts, keeping puck possession, and trying not to force plays. The poster boy of how not to do things in this case was Andre Burakovsky, the Kraken’s leading scorer. With his teammates in his wake, Burakovsky tried to pull off a 3-zone rush that ended with a turnover after he tried to work through two defenders in the offensive zone. The resulting Winnipeg 2-on-1 rush ended with Mark Scheifele’s game winner.
The Kraken are 0-and-3 in overtimes this season.
“We played the small area 3-on-3 games that we played today (in practice), it may not have looked like it, but there’s a real purpose to it,” Hakstol said. “It’s all a part of some of the little things that we need to do better 3-on-3.”
The coach went on to point out that in two of the three overtime losses, against Anaheim and Winnipeg, Seattle was guilty of the aforementioned mistakes.
“We’re on the ice too long, we took an extra stab at the offensive side, instead of making a good decision to make a change with possession of the puck and reset it when we don’t like what we see,” Hakstol added. “Just forcing it a little bit too much.”
Practice on Wednesday will be less intense physically with a game against the New York Rangers scheduled for Thursday night at Climate Pledge Arena.
