Kraken Rally Falls Short In Final Home Game

One of the early season Kraken goals for the home portion of their schedule completed Monday night was to play better for their Climate Pledge Arena fans.

There were moments where that indeed happened, even though this 5-3 loss to the Los Angeles Kings on Fan Appreciation Night, pres. by Amazon, prevented the Kraken from topping their previous best home point total set during the 2022-23 playoff season. Quinton Byfield got a natural hat trick started Monday by scoring on his team’s second shot against AHL emergency callup Nikke Kokko, then added a breakaway goal later in the first period and another marker in the second.

The Kings were off to the races from there, clinching the final Western Conference wild card spot with the victory and an earlier Nashville loss in regulation. 

“We’re just not setting ourselves up for success,” Kraken alternate captain Matty Beniers, who had two assists on the night, said after his team closed out the home portion of their schedule at 19-17-5. “It’s tough to come back from those two, three-goal deficits, especially in the third period.”

The Kraken didn’t score until that final frame, with Adam Larsson and Freddy Gaudreau tallying in the opening eight-plus minutes. Adrian Kempe then scored a fourth Los Angeles goal and though Beniers later set up Bobby McMann for a third Kraken marker late with the goalie pulled and empty netter by Adrian Kempe handed the Kraken the fourth straight Fan Appreciation Night defeat. 

The 43 points for the Kraken at home is one fewer than they had three years ago in going 20-16-4, but also just two ahead of the 41 points from 18-18-5 last year.

“That’s kind of been something that’s been on my mind the last four years, we’ve kind of had a tough home record,” Kraken captain Jordan Eberle, named postgame as winner of the Pete Muldoon Award as the team’s Most Valuable Player and the Guyle Fielder Award for perseverance and dedication to hockey, had said after Monday’s morning skate. “So, what are we? (Around) .500 right now? I mean, obviously you want to be above that. You want to be protecting home ice as much as you can and have that advantage.

“So, we took a minor step, but not where we need to be.”

Beyond Eberle getting team MVP, voted on by the Seattle chapter of the Professional Hockey Writers Association and the Fielder award – voted on by Kraken players and named after the late Seattle Totems great who died in February at age 95 -- Beniers collected the Three Stars of the Year Award for the most cumulative points in earning a postgame star selection. And goalie Philipp Grubauer took home the Fan Favorite Award. 

The Kraken started the season much better at home than they finished.

They enjoyed a franchise record 4-0-2 start at Climate Pledge and didn’t lose a regulation game there until San Jose beat them on Nov. 5.  The second home regulation loss didn’t come until Nov. 26, when they entered 5-1-3 against the Dallas Stars but were beaten 3-2.

That sent the Kraken on a tailspin of six consecutive losses and 10 defeats in 11 contests both home and away. The streakiness would define their season as they immediately turned around and embarked on a 10-game points streak in which they went 8-0-2 and erased much of the damage from their prior losing stretch.

They were 10-8-4 at home by that point in early January, 14-10-4 there when the Winter Olympic break rolled around and 16-10-4 at Climate Pledge after beating Carolina and Vancouver when the schedule resumed.

But they lost to St. Louis on March 4 and dropped four consecutive games in regulation that homestand; leading to a 1-7-0 home stretch that carried them to the brink of elimination before capturing two Climate Pledge victories in a row last week with their season effectively done.

Kraken head coach Lane Lambert felt Monday’s loss was a bit of a microcosm for the season; his team playing well enough but done in by costly mistakes.

“When it was 3-0, it wasn’t a 3-0 hockey game,” he said. “It was a pretty even hockey game to be honest with you, all the way through. A couple of bounces over our sticks and I feel they made us pay. Certainly, our game management in areas of the first and second period wasn’t great.”

Kraken defender Ryan Lindgren had the puck hop over his stick in the opposing zone and Byfield raced back 2-on-1 the other way before wristing a shot up over Kokko’s glove to open the scoring. Later in the period, Eberle attempted a pass back to Lindgren at the point, but the puck hopped over his stick and Byfield sprinted in alone and deked out Kokko for his second goal.

Byfield would complete the natural hat trick of three consecutive goals before the midway mark of the second period.

Lambert had said after Monday’s morning skate he felt the team had pockets of extended strong play at home but that faded down the stretch as did the team overall. 

“I think certainly if you look at that stretch that we had after the Olympic break, if you look at that little microcosm, you’re not very excited about it,” Lambert said. “I think that certainly, when we needed to, we didn’t accomplish what we wanted to. From that standpoint, certainly our home record wasn’t any help. You know, there’s pockets in certain areas, obviously, that we played very well at home. So, we will analyze it. But I think there was good and bad. Certainly, the bad right now outweighs the good.”

Prior to the Kraken doing all their third period scoring, the loudest fan cheers came when Jacob Melanson got into a fierce first period fight with towering 6-foot-6, 225-pound Samuel Helenius -- who’s already had a half-dozen bouts this season. Melanson had gotten tagged with several jabs in a prior December 2023 bout with Helenius in the AHL and said he went seeking “some redemption” and to “fire up the crowd here tonight and to get the guys going.”

Despite giving away half-a-foot and 18 pounds to Helenius, Melanson hung in there trading several heavy punches with the big man. Both combatants wound up heading to their respective locker rooms for repairs afterward.

Melanson said the fans have been great all season on a team and personal level.

“It’s been awesome,” Melanson said. “I mean, the fans have supported me and my journey up here the whole time so I can’t thank them enough. And they show it every night whether we’re winning or losing. They deserve better and deserve to see us in the playoffs.”

Beniers agreed, admitting he didn’t know the team’s exact home record but feeling it wasn’t enough.

“I don’t think we got to where we wanted to,” he said. “Obviously, we’re not in the playoffs, so, you know, it’s a little bit disappointing. I think we definitely had the ability to do it. We had put ourselves in a spot to do it after the break and just didn’t get it done.”