One: Just win, baby – Kind of risky these days quoting anybody from the NFL Raiders franchise on winning. But “Just win, baby” was coined by former owner Al Davis right after the team had captured Super Bowl titles first in Oakland and then upon moving to Los Angeles in the early 1980s, not while getting routed weekly in Las Vegas.
Still, the Kraken need and will take any win, any way they can get one right now. It’s been 2 ½ weeks since their last victory in Pittsburgh and six straight defeats – the last five in regulation – have put a dent in what had been a shiny new season start. Only the Nashville Predators at 10 wins have fewer victories than the Kraken. Where the Kraken had excelled was in also capturing points for overtime and shootout losses but even that’s gone away.
Right now, due to all that, the Kraken need to start piling up two points per game as quickly as possible. The Los Angeles Kings are always a tough fight, as the 7-7-1 lifetime record between these teams suggests. In fact, the Kings have won three of the last four contests at Climate Pledge Arena.
The Kraken have shown signs of playing better lately, losing by a late goal at home to Detroit and then seeing the Minnesota Wild snap a 1-1 tie in the third on Monday ahead of two empty net goals that sealed a 4-1 loss.
Still, style points no longer help. This team needs to put it all together and come away with a win and two points.
“The league is a difficult league, it’s a ruthless league,” Kraken head coach Lane Lambert said after practice on Tuesday. “Nobody cares (about your struggles). Everybody’s coming in to beat you. But at the same time, if you look at it, two weeks ago we were one point out of first place and heading into a home game against Dallas which we played very well in and probably could have won.
“Now, where we’re sitting that’s changed fast. But as fast as it changes in one direction it can change in the other direction. And that’s got to be our focus right now.”
The Kraken have played fewer contests than all the Pacific Division teams and can vault right back up the standings by converting those games in-hand into victories. But, as Lambert said, now is when it needs to happen.
They also need to start taking advantage of these home games, having fallen to 6-5-3 at Climate Pledge courtesy of four consecutive regulation losses there. Their prior home victory came Nov. 15, and they have just two wins at Climate Pledge since Nov. 3. They had made it a tough place to play early on and need to resume that.
Two: Make special teams special again – One of the bigger steps taken in Monday’s loss to the Wild was both ends of Kraken special teams coming through. The power play went 1-for-3 and accounted for the night’s only Kraken goal, by Jordan Eberle, while the penalty kill was 3-for-3 in fending off Minnesota’s attack.
Heading into the game, the Kraken had yielded goals on seven of their last eight penalty kill attempts while the power play had gone just 2-for-22 in the prior seven matchups. As a result, the penalty kill as of Tuesday was still worst in the league at 66.2% while the power play was 22nd at 17.5% even with Monday’s positive performances.
One key to helping special teams has been attempting to simplify approaches.
On the power play, as with the even-strength offense, the Kraken have sought to get to the net front to convert close-in passes -- as was the case on Eberle’s goal -- as well as to screen the goaltender or get second chances on rebounds. With the penalty kill, it’s about tweaking things to get in the way of more passes and keep pucks to the outside through proper positioning. Players had been caught out of position multiple times by lightning-quick passes in recent games, allowing for wide open shooters to tee-off from point-blank range.
Three: Know your foe – The Kings, as mentioned, are dead even lifetime foes at 7-7-1, with a 9-8 overtime win by the Kraken in November 2022 perhaps best symbolizing how closely this rivalry has unfolded. Their last matchup came on last season’s final night with the Kings prevailing 6-5 at Climate Pledge.
Los Angeles arrives in town coming off consecutive wins over Chicago at home and Utah on the road. They also, much like the Kraken earlier this season, seem to like extending games beyond regulation – having done so 12 times already, tied with Columbus for the league lead.
Another commonality shared is that both teams struggle to put pucks in the net, the Kraken tied with Calgary for the league’s fewest goals per game at 2.48 while the Kings have the sixth fewest at 2.72. Defensively, the Kings are very tight at a third-best 2.48 goals allowed per contest while the Kraken’s recent spate of losses have seen them slip in goal prevention all the way down to 15th at 2.96 goals per game given up.
Adrian Kempe, as expected, leads the team with 10 goals and 26 points while Kevin Fiala is tied for the goals lead at 10. Anze Kopitar is fourth in scoring with 15 points, four behind winger Quinton Byfield.
The Kraken probably don’t want to face backup netminder Anton Forsberg, who shut them out as a member of the Ottawa Senators the last two times they met head-to-head in November 2024 and December 2023.
Otherwise, the Kings usually go with Darcy Kuemper, who replaced Philipp Grubauer in Colorado after he signed with the Kraken in July 2021 and went on to win a Stanley Cup with the Avalanche his lone ensuing season with that team. The Kraken have since beaten Kuemper three straight times when he played with both the Kings and Washington.
Projected Lines (not official)
McCann-Beniers-Eberle
Kakko-Stephenson-Tolvanen
Marchment-Wright-Nyman
Kartye-Gaudreau-Winterton
Dunn-Larsson
Lindgren-Montour
Evans-Oleksiak
Daccord
