When brand new Rangers winger Vladimir Tarasenko scored his first goal with his new team just 2:49 into the first period, things didn’t look so good for the Seattle Kraken.
Shake it off.
When Kaapo Kakko scored 2:13 later, his first goal in 16 games, concern for the Kraken’s readiness for the evening started to come into question. There were turnovers and poor positional play.
At 14:29, Vince Trocheck made it 3-0. The Kraken and goaltender Martin Jones were bombarded.
Just when the Kraken looked like they had righted the ship coming out of the long break with solid all-around play in the loss against the New Jersey Devils, the first period against the Rangers was a step backwards.
Kraken Goal Scorers:
2nd Period
Seattle seemed to wake up to some degree after Rangers defenseman Jacob Trouba scored on the power play at 1:03 of the 2nd period to make it 4-0.
Oliver Bjorkstrand would score for the Kraken 1:04 later.
4-1 Rangers – Even Strength – Oliver Bjorkstrand (10) from Eeli Tolvanen, 2:07 …
The Kraken caught the Rangers on a bad line change and a stretch pass gave Bjorkstrand a breakaway on Igor Shesterkin.
Moments after their goal the Kraken picked up a power play opportunity and failed to click. They could have used it, but instead their man advantage slump stretched to 12 consecutive chances.
They’d get another opportunity late in the period and fail again.
3rd Period
After giving up a power play goal to Mika Zibanejad at 3:19 to fall behind 5-1, the Kraken waited just a couple of minutes to jump back into the game with two goals in 22-seconds.
5-2 Rangers – Power Play – Jared McCann (24) from Vince Dunn and Oliver Bjorkstrand, 5:59
McCann stepped into a slapper from the left point through a screen, top shelf, glove side.
5-3 Rangers – Even Strength – Brandon Tanev (10) from Ryan Donato and Vince Dunn, 6:21
After a nice cross ice feed, Tanev wheeled in and tucked one five hole on Shesterkin.
— Tanev would get a late shorthanded breakaway but got stopped. With the teams 4-on-4, Seattle called a time-out and pulled their goalie with about four minutes remaining and down two goals. Ryan Lindgren scored a shorthanded empty-netter for the Rangers.
— Seattle outshot the Rangers 29-28. Power plays: Seattle 1-for-5, New York 2-for-3.
— Seattle plays in Philadelphia in a matinee against the Flyers on Sunday.
