Kraken Crash
Thursday night final at Climate Pledge Arena: New Jersey Devils 2, Seattle Kraken 1.
The Seattle Kraken last won a hockey game on November 22nd, a 7-1 victory at home over the NHL’s worst team, the Sharks. San Jose’s win percentage is now .333. The Kraken: .407.
In terms of point totals in the standings, the Kraken and their 22 are much closer to the league’s bottom, five points better than the Chicago Blackhawks (17), than they are from the top, the Vegas Golden Knights (39).
Seattle has the NHL’s 3rd worst goal differential, a minus-23. Much of this has to do with a lack of scoring, pure and simple. The production from the bottom-six, particularly the 4th line, a boon last season, is non-existent.
At this point the club appears to be relying on the return of Andre Burakovsky, who tallied an assist last night in his first game back after missing 19, and call-ups from the American Hockey League.
Defenseman Ryker Evans played in his first NHL game last night, recording 17:50 in ice time, 3rd most among the blueliners, after replacing Justin Schultz for the evening.
Developing and testing prospects is fine and dandy, and hopes will be high for Burakovsky to produce, while also waiting for injured Jaden Schwartz to return, but it’s simply not enough for a team looking for a playoff spot in 2024.
Ovie’s Big Mark
Alexander Ovechkin has played in 1,370 regular-season games for the Washington Capitals over 19 NHL seasons since being the club’s top overall pick in the 2004 NHL Draft. Thursday night he tallied his 1,500th career point, the 16th player in league history to do so.
Ovie reached the mark with an assist in a 5-4 shoot-out loss to the Dallas Stars in Washington.
“It’s a pretty cool number,” Ovechkin said postgame. “I always say, without my teammates, I would never reach it. It’s pretty cool.”
Meanwhile, Ovie needs 67 goals to tie Wayne Gretzky for the most in NHL history, 894. He’ll likely need to play well into the 2025-’26 season to get there and it appears he has no plans on giving up anytime soon.
He’ll turn 40 in September of 2025.
Recent Kraken:
— The “Simmer and Forslund” Kraken-centric podcast tells it like it is.
