One: Start on time
Yeah, the Kraken made a game of it after falling behind by multiple goals entering the third periods of three of their last four contests – managing to still go 1-1-1 in those comeback outings.
But it’s time to start off games the way they’ve been finishing them. Playing from behind causes undue stress on the skaters, especially when it comes to sticking within game plans. It also puts undue stress on goaltenders and Philipp Grubauer has done an admirable job keeping the Kraken in a position to win those games.
Plus, there’s no reason for the Kraken to have come out as flat as they did Saturday night against Edmonton. They’d spent preceding days discussing amongst themselves and the media the need to have better puck play overall. Then, the minute that puck was dropped to start the game, they proceeded to give it away as often as they could.
That’s a focus issue that needs to be corrected -- and fast. The Kraken have proven capable of sticking with the best of teams and outplaying them late. So, the corrective action will be to play that way from the beginning so that they aren’t expending all their energy chasing the game.
Two: Make the second half count
Monday’s game marks the Kraken’s official halfway point in the season and for some easy measuring of where they’re at. Right now, that’s at a sub-80-point pace and below the 81 points they finished with a season ago.
That’s clearly not where they expected to be and needs to change.
From an individual perspective, only Jared McCann and Jaden Schwartz are halfway towards a 25-goal season. Oliver Bjorkstrand is the only other Kraken player on pace to score 20. McCann is the team points leader but might not even reach 60 for the season.
On a positive note, defenseman Brandon Montour has already matched his eight goals from a season ago and is only 11 points behind his 33 from the prior campaign as well. Schwartz at 13 goals has already matched last season’s number and has a shot at his career high of 28 from a decade ago with St. Louis.
Vince Dunn after just 20 games has produced at a clip that would result in 30 goals and 70 points over a full season if he’d stayed healthy.
So, all is not lost. But it’s time for others to step up their games if they want to make this season resemble more of what was expected.
Three: Know Your Foe
The Kraken lost 3-2 to the Devils a month ago in a game where they were vastly outshot but did themselves in only by helping put more pucks in their own net than the New Jersey shooters did. So, they’ve shown they can hang with one of the NHL’s better clubs on the road despite never once beating them there.
In fact, the Kraken have never beaten the Devils in regulation anyplace – going 2-5-0 with the lone wins coming at home in overtime and a shootout. They’ve dropped four straight to new Jersey since their most recent victory in this series two years ago this month.
But right now, the Devils don’t look like one of the league’s best. They’ve dropped four in a row to start their current six-game road trip – scoring just six times in the four defeats -- and like the Kraken have struggled to consistently maintain their overall structure in trying to generate offense.
That offensive slowdown could buy the Kraken time to get their own offense going and ease some of the stings of possibly losing Adam Larsson to that upper-body injury suffered the other night. Larsson has never missed a Kraken game due to injury – skipping one last spring for the birth of his child – but the team was non-committal about whether his leaving Saturday’s game in the second period was a precursor towards being out longer.
Still, the Devils have five players – Jesper Bratt, Jack Hughes, Nico Hischier, Timo Meier and Stefan Noesen – with 14 or more goals while no Kraken player has topped 13. So, they are still an offensive threat, especially Hischier with his team-leading 19.
On the flip side, they’ve also allowed no more than three goals in 10 of their last 12 games – owed largely to the continued strong play of goalie Jacob Markstrom, who owns the NHL’s third best goals against average at 2.16 and has given up more than three in a game only twice in his last 22 outings.
