It looked like Seattle was on the scoreboard first Thursday night in Canada's capitol, but Appleton's deflection-goal off a Blackwell shot was disallowed because linemate Gourde was offside.
From there, the night tilted sideways for the visitors.
"The first two periods were inexcusable, I think we all know that," said Donato, who scored after sitting out the first three games of this five-game road trip. "Our momentum was dead. Jared got a big goal and the guys all thought we were back in it ... it's a testament to our character."
When asked about scoring after his imposed layoff, Donato was forthright: "I make sure I am ready, and it's about capitalizing [when in the lineup] ... I pray for my opportunity, right? ... when my number is called, I want to give max effort."
Fifteen seconds after the no-goal ruling, 22-year-old Ottawa captain Brady Tkachuk, stick on puck for a bit longer than Kraken coaches are going to like when they watch the film, zipped a pass to 22-year-old Norris, who was parked outside goalie Chris Driedger's left post for the redirection and 1-0 Senators lead. Norris leads the Senators with 22 goals and Tkachuk leads in overall points (42 on strength of now 20 goals and 22).
Seven minutes into the second period, it was Tkachuk's turn to score, picking up a loose puck net-front after Ottawa defenseman Artem Zub shot from the right point to make it 2-0. Young German-born Tim Stutzle started the scoring play when Oleksiak's outlet pass was intercepted by Stutzle.
Fellow Ottawa forward Parker Kelly completed a 22-year-old hat trick when he scored after Adam Larsson mishandled the puck in the Kraken defensive zone. Parker stole and quick-released the puck past Driedger, who no doubt would have liked to wipe out Larsson's rare D-zone mistake instead. Stutzle has 13 goals and 21 assists after Thursday night's work.
Driedger made big saves toward the end of the second period and kicked out one more high-danger scoring chance early third period before McCann, Donato and Appleton evened the score with help from a number of teammates.
"We just came alive," said McCann when asked about the change in momentum during the third period. "We played simple."
McCann acknowledged the hockey cliché but his point is when a team is desperate to get back into the game, there is no overthinking the puck movement, more urgency about getting pucks and bodies to the net.
"The first two periods were pretty bad, we had some bad turnovers," McCann said. "We were desperate in the third period."