One: Keep ‘McMann-ing up’ at the net front – There’s a reason the Kraken went out and got Bobby McMann at the trade deadline. And now, with five points in his first two Kraken games, the 6-foot-2, 217-pounder has shown what a skilled big man is capable of when he goes to the net and doesn’t hesitate to shoot.
McMann thus far has been a missing ingredient the Kraken appear to have lacked a good part of the season. Sure, they have a fourth line that can bang around the net front. They had Jaden Schwartz willing to do it when healthy. But you can’t teach size and you can’t teach speed. Combine those natural abilities with an aggressive mindset and all of a sudden, the Kraken have 11 goals in their last two games. Yes, they came against struggling Canucks and Panthers squads. But the Kraken have spent all season “playing down” to beatable opponents and “playing up” to the good teams.
Bottom line: They needed two points in each of those games and got them. They can worry about style points after they make the playoffs.
Two: Keep “playing up” to opponents with good records – The Kraken shouldn’t need any help getting up for this game. They’ll have had a day off after the back-to-backs with Vancouver and Florida and the Tampa Bay Lightning are the kind of team they tend to do well against.
They’ve got three wins against the Los Angeles Kings and two wins apiece against the Vegas Golden Knights, Anaheim Ducks and San Jose Sharks this season. Also, single wins over Carolina, Pittsburgh, Edmonton, Boston and the New York Islanders, not to mention two overtime losses to Montreal, another to Columbus and shootout defeats to the Islanders and Ottawa.
They can hang with the good teams. They even hung with Colorado for two periods last week after standing around in awe of them in a terrible opening frame. They’d hung with the Avalanche the entire game and nearly beat them the first time they played a few months ago.
When the Kraken show up from the start of a game through the final horn, they can hang with anybody. The trick is getting them to show up from the get-go. With only 17 games to play and still holding on to the final Western Conference wild card spot by a point over San Jose and two over Los Angeles, they shouldn’t need motivation.
Three: Know your foe – The Kraken know some of the Lightning very well as former alternate captain Yanni Gourde plays his first game against his team of nearly four years. Oliver Bjorkstrand was around for nearly three years and both were key parts of the Kraken’s first and only playoff run.
So, nothing really unknown there. Nor is it unknown to see the Lightning hanging around near the top of the NHL standings. Don’t forget, this team made the Stanley Cup Final three consecutive seasons through the 2021-22 campaign. There’d been some thinking they were on the way down again, but this season they’ve been fighting for top spot in a very tough Atlantic Division and enter with the NHL’s sixth highest points total.
Their goal differential of +49 is third highest in the league.
They can beat you in multiple ways, starting with the guy in net. Andrei Vasilevskiy has a .914 save percentage tied for the league’s second best and a 2.30 goals against average that is the league’s third best, both helping produce an NHL-high 30 wins by him. That has backstopped a defense allowing the NHL’s third fewest goals per game at 2.77.
Offensively, Nikita Kucherov has the league’s third most points at 106 points, while Jake Guentzel, Brandon Hagel and Darren Raddysh all have at least 10 more points than Kraken team leader Jordan Eberle. Not surprisingly, the Lightning have the NHL’s third most goals per game at 3.49.
These guys are as good as anyone in the NHL when on their game. The Kraken are 1-6-1 lifetime against the Lightning and have never beaten them at Climate Pledge Arena. So, they have a job ahead.
\\Projected lineup (not official):
\\McMann - Beniers - Eberle
McCann - Stephenson - Tolvanen
Catton - Wright - Kakko
Meyers - Gaudreau - Winterton
Dunn - Larsson
Lindgren - Montour
Oleksiak - Evans
Daccord
