Kraken Game Facts
Tonight: Seattle Kraken at Detroit Red Wings
Where: Little Caesar’s Arena
When: 5:15 pm pacific – One of 16 NHL games on Tuesday, part of the NHL’s all-32-team “Frozen Frenzy”.
TV/Radio: ROOT Sports NW / FM 93.3
Nothing like starting the season 1-4-and-1 and having to face one of the NHL’s hottest teams, but that’s a perfect description of the Seattle Kraken’s situation as they stop in Motown to take on the Red Wings.
Detroit has won five games in a row while piling up goals. Here’s the run since Saturday, October 14th: 6-4 over the Tampa Bay Lightning, 4-0 against the Columbus Blue Jackets, 6-3 vs. the Pittsburgh Penguins, 5-2 on the Ottawa Senators, and 6-2 over the Calgary Flames.
The wins alternated home and away while averaging 5.4 goals per game. Their only loss was a 4-3 setback on the road to the New Jersey Devils to open the season. The Wings are a rebuilding team starting to feel their oats.
The Kraken are averaging 1.83 goals per game with seven of their 11 coming in one match against the Carolina Hurricanes.
Key Factors:
Starting goaltenders: Joey Daccord for Seattle, Ville Husso for Detroit.
The only points in the standings the Kraken have earned this season have been with Daccord in net, so why not. Seattle picked up a point in a shoot-out loss in St. Louis against the Blues and beat the Hurricanes at home with their ‘back-up’ between the pipes.
Based on how things go, will this mean head coach Dave Hakstol will start saying what he said last year with Martin Jones winning on a regular basis; that there is no “number-one” goalie?
‘Hak’ has juggled his lines for this one, with rookie Tye Kartye moving to the top line, something we saw in the playoffs. Jared McCann drops to the third line. Devin Shore enters the line-up with Andre Burakovsky hurt, another factor that precipitated some line shuffling.
Expected Seattle line-up:
Tye Kartye – Matty Beniers – Jordan Eberle
Jaden Schwartz – Alex Wennberg – Oliver Bjorkstrand
Jared McCann – Yanni Gourde – Eeli Tolvanen
Devin Shore – Pierre-Edouard Bellemare – Kailer Yamamoto
Vince Dunn – Adam Larsson
Jamie Oleksiak – Will Borgen
Brian Dumoulin – Justin Schultz
Joey Daccord
Philipp Grubauer
Who’s Hot? And Not …
Detroit area native Alex Debrincat joined his hometown club and his 3rd NHL organization when he arrived in a trade from the Ottawa Senators in July. The 25-year-old right wing, drafted by the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2nd-round in 2016, leads the league in goals and points with eight and 12 respectively.
Former Kraken forward Daniel Sprong has two goals and two assists in his first six games with Detroit.
Vince Dunn leads the Kraken in scoring with five points in six games. The top-pair D-man was Seattle’s 2nd leading scorer last season. No one else could really be described as ‘hot’, particularly coming out of a poor team-wide performance against the Rangers.
Special Teams
Through six games the Kraken are nearly perfect on the penalty kill this season, 15-for-16, with a shorthanded goal against the Hurricanes thrown in the mix. Pierre-Edouard Bellemare lit the lamp.
The power play has been inconsistent to say the least. The club is 3-for-18 overall, with two of the PP goals coming against Carolina. 16.7% is the season number.
The Red Wings come in at 39.1% on the man advantage, 2nd best in the NHL. That 9-for-23 clip is a big reason they’ve been winning. Again, it’s early in the season, the numbers are small, and a little bit of success can swing a team’s numbers dramatically.
On the penalty kill, the ‘Winged Wheel’ have faced a shorthanded situation 23 times this season, 4th most in the NHL. They’ve only been scored on three times.
Coming In:
Kraken: 1-4-and-1, coming off a 4-1 home loss on Saturday to the New York Rangers.
Red Wings: 5-and-1, off a 6-2 home victory over the Calgary Flames on Sunday.
The Kraken swept the season series in 2022-’23 with a home victory 4-2 on February 18th and a 5-4 overtime win in Detroit on March 2nd. The Red Wings are one of three teams, along with the Blue Jackets and Sabres, that have never beaten the Kraken in regulation.
Recent Kraken:
— Simmer’s Sunday 9: Lights Out, ‘Lifeless’ Kraken, McDavid Hurt
