OT Thriller: Kraken “W” in Last Four Seconds

So far, so great and so thrilling for new coach Lane Lambert and his team. The Kraken defeated its second divisional foe in three nights, ousting the Vegas Golden Knights with another elite outing by goaltender Joey Daccord and an inspirational performance by the Matty Beniers line, plus offensively gifted defenseman Brandon Montour showing a gritty side of his repertoire in a 2-1 overtime win. How exciting was this game? Jared McCann scored the overtime winner with 3.8 seconds left in overtime. It marked his 400^th NHL career point.

Beniers, who scored the game’s first goal way back in the first period, had the puck on his stick with seven seconds remaining in overtime. He played it with the patience of the veteran he has become in his fourth full NHL season. Seven seconds was enough time to decide it wasn’t his shot, and linemate McCann was the best option.

“I'd love to have beat them, but time was running down,” said Beniers, who is the player younger Kraken first-rounders (and second rounders) reference when asked who they see as a role model. “I saw Canner at the net. I just kind of put a good one in there, using ‘D’ as a screen. Canner did a great job to get good positioning and bang that one home.”

During the first period, the twin boards showed the Mariners' dramatic 15^th inning win to thundering cheers. But it was even louder when McCann scored the OT winner. It’s the first time in five seasons the Kraken opened the year with two wins.

McCann, Beniers and other teammates attended Friday’s big win for the Mariners, noting they couldn’t stay the whole five hours in order to be ready and rested for Saturday’s matchup.

“They were electric last night," said Beniers about the Mariners and their fans ... that was a fun game. A lot of us got to go to it. It's fun cheering on those guys. They were awesome. That was definitely something we were talking about [before Saturday’s win]. They got the city going. Hopefully, we can keep it going.”

“It's amazing,” said McCann about the buzz around the city. “We’re really proud of them ... we’re trying to add to the winning.”

Good Start Harkens Good Outcome

The Kraken revved up early here Saturday night, keeping pace and then some with a formidable Vegas team. Goalie Joey Daccord did his part with 23 saves in regulation, proving a major reason for the Kraken earning the standings point awarded for getting to overtime.

Coach Lane Lambert trusted most all of his players to be on the ice in the closing minutes of regulation. He liked a lot of what he saw on the ice and among his players on the bench and between periods. As his squad and Kraken fans are learning fast, he said there is room for improvement. That’s not a negative, just his mindset about how an NHL team finds its way to success in the form of postseason bids. He did like Saturday’s start compared to the Thursday win over Anaheim.

“I said right from day one, we'll continue to continue to build,” said Lambert, who, to bury the lead, called the Beniers/Eberle goal and McCann’s game-winner “elite plays.” “There are some things that we did really well. I think there are areas that we can improve on.

“We have to be more consistent for 60 minutes from the start of the game. Last game, we didn't have a very good start. Really, in the second and third period [Saturday], the offense dried up for both teams. There weren't a lot of chances. There wasn't a lot of ice. Either way, those are the games you have to be patient with. You have to wait for your opportunities and trust that process.

“You can't try to make whole plays and blind plays and get impatient. Impatience is death in hockey, because you start doing that and you start giving them some rushes the other way. I thought the effort was good, and it's been good since day one.”

Montour Mixes It Up

Montour put a big hit on VGK defenseman Zach Whitecloud in the neutral zone, knocking over the 6-foot-2, 210-pound defenseman who was batting down the high puck. Montour was quickly challenged to a scrap by Vegas D-man Ben Hutton. Montour was happy to answer with some landed punches and wrestled Hutton to the ice. The home crowd, which roared during a first-period break in play when the Mariners’ 15^th inning winning hit was on the twin boards, went high-decibel again for Montour. His SEA teammates were banging sticks on the boards and/or ice to a man.

“That picked up the intensity in the building,” said Kraken Hockey Network analyst JT Brown. “The [Kraken] are fired up right there in front of their bench. You’re not going to get 10 fights a year [from Montour], but his not afraid to drop his gloves.”

Third Time Not the Charm

The Kraken kept a clean score sheet on the visitors’ first two power plays, but when forward Ryan Winterton went to the box for tripping. Jack Eichel hit a post early on that man-advantage segment. But the Kraken good fortune dipped seconds later, 24-year-old Russian-born Pavel Dorofeyev took a feed from veteran forward Mark Stone, firing a shot upper right corner to beat Joey Daccord. Dorofeyev, who notched a hat trick in the Vegas season opener, now has five goals on the year, four on the power play.

Pace Makers in the First 20 Minutes

The Kraken controlled the pace and scoring chances early here Saturday in front of a capacity crowd first revved by a new pre-game presentation that decidedly leans into modern nautical maneuvers and music that feels like Seattle on every note. The team was tuned from puck drop, generating four shots on goal in the first 10 minutes of the opening period, along with a couple of near-misses on a just-wide slap shot by Brandon Montour and a captain Jordan Eberle close-in wrist shot hitting the goal iron.

That one shot by Vegas was a Grade-A chance by first-liner Ivan Barbashev, who has the good fortune of playing left wing alongside star center Jack Eichel and star right wing Mitch Marner. Kraken starting goalie Joey Daccord stopped Barbashev to keep it scoreless and made a couple more high-quality saves mid-frame. Daccord made a point-blank save on Colton Sissons late in the period to continue his hot start of one goal scored on him in the first four periods of the regular season, which extended to five after hanging another zero on Vegas in the middle period.

The shots on goal finished at 9-7 in favor of Seattle at first intermission, boosted by a late flurry of home-squad scoring chances during extended offensive zone possession in the final two minutes of the period. The best chance didn’t register in the SOG column with a skilled Jared McCann pass that landed on Matty Beniers’ stick blade, but the young center's redirect was just wide.