Vince Dunn of the Seattle Kraken will be writing a blog for NHL.com leading up to, and after, playing the Vegas Golden Knights in the 2024 Discover NHL Winter Classic at T-Mobile Park in Seattle on Monday (3 p.m. ET; MAX, TNT, truTV, SN, TVAS).
In his first installment, the 27-year-old defenseman writes about playing in his first outdoor game; he joined the St. Louis Blues one season after they played in the 2017 Winter Classic, and was selected by the Kraken in the 2021 NHL Expansion Draft one season before the Blues played in the 2022 Winter Classic.
Dunn, who scored a goal in the Kraken’s 2-1 overtime win against the Philadelphia Flyers on Friday, also writes about Seattle carrying a four-game winning streak into the outdoor game.
Having the Winter Classic coming up can be a little distracting, especially for the guys who already have family and friends and whatnot in town. And I think it's just been talked about the whole year, so it's always been in the back of our minds to try to get everyone into that game. So, I think getting the job done tonight makes that much of a difference for our team to just know that we didn't lay an egg, and we don’t go into the game with bad emotions for New Year's. Right now, it's exciting, but there's going to be a lot of distractions. So, I think if we can just tune those out and take it all in, play with the adrenaline that we're going to be given by the fans and just roll with it, we’ll be fine.
I’ve never played in an outdoor game. I missed both of them in St. Louis. It was too late, and then I left. I’m super excited. Everyone in Canada always plays on the outdoor rinks growing up and yeah, it's going to be a really cool atmosphere and hopefully, we can get that roof open. So, I'm really looking forward to it and I'm sure everyone else is in the dressing room tonight.
The game is really important, and as much as it's going to be fun, it's still business on the line, and we’re playing a great team and a team that we're competing with. We need to realize that there's a job to be done, to not just be overwhelmed by the atmosphere.
I’ll probably try to get all of my family and friend time in [Saturday], and then try to have a good day at work on Sunday and take in the atmosphere when we practice at T-Mobile, and just try to keep things rolling. So, I think everyone's probably going to be doing the same thing. It's going to be a lot going on Sunday, and especially in the morning to the game.
As for playing outdoors, I think some games, we've had the ends open in our building, and you kind of get that glare and that sunlight coming through, so it'll be a lot of that in the park. I think that's about as close as I can get for comparing them.
