Ivan Ivan faceoff win, Max Curran feeds Bryan Yoon and Yoon gets puck on net for Jason Polin to chip home. pic.twitter.com/wVZpkEn5MI

— Meghan Angley (@megangley) September 15, 2024

Ivan Ivan

— After playing the entire season with the Colorado Eagles, Ivan earned himself a NHL contract with the Colorado Avalanche. During game two of the Rookie Faceoff, Ivan flooded the slot and kept throwing rubber on net. During one power play chance, Ivan had three shots alone. He dug deep in the corners, something I know he has been striving to be better at, and caused a couple of turnovers. Ivan will be a sight to watch this year in Loveland with a real chance to fight for a spot on the Avalanche roster next year.

Ondrej Pavel

— Ondrej Pavel continued to show exactly why the Avalanche and Eagles love him. Pavel is extremely aggressive on the forecheck and it comes into play on the penalty kill. Today, Pavel did a lot of that. He pushed the forecheck hard and stole the puck to create breakaways. He plays a lot like Logan O’Connor and has the same speed bursts that O’Connor does. The Czechia native made his NHL debut last season and could be in the running for a call-up this season for depth.

Matthew Stienburg

After being originally drafted 63rd overall in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft, Matthew Stienburg did not join the Avalanche system until 2022-23. Today, Stienburg played to his strengths. He got around the corners and created chances and added physicality. Trying to turn the tide in the Avalanche’s favor, Stienburg dropped the gloves in the second period and won the fight. The Canadian has a reputation for being physical and using both his body and fists. He adds a bit of sandpaper whenever he is in the lineup. I do not see him making his NHL debut soon, but he was impressive today.

FIBIGR WHAT A SNIPE! pic.twitter.com/FCvmJkiB1Z

— Seattle Kraken (@SeattleKraken) September 14, 2024

Conclusion

It is important to remember that these games do not count. Colorado struggled on the power play without Oskar Olausson and Calum Ritchie in the lineup today. The hope is that by watching these games; it shines a light on some prospects. The few that I highlighted today were just a few who played well, but it gives some hope for the future.

The post Standouts from Avalanche game two loss in Rookie Faceoff appeared first on The Rink.

Monday’s game was a chance for revenge on the Seattle Kraken’s home ice with the final matchup between the two teams. After taking a 4–3 loss to them on Thursday, there was certainly much to be resolved and a get-right performance was imperative to breaking an unsavory streak of shortcomings.

Artturi Lehkonen recently went on long-term injured reserve after taking a hard hit from Seattle’s Jamie Oleksiak just a few days ago, and his absence in the lineup was felt. Andrew Cogliano also walked away from the game banged up, leaving room for youngsters to step up.

Answering the call was Sam Malinski, who was making his NHL debut, and Caleb Jones, who replaced Sam Girard and Josh Manson.

First period

The first frame of the game was slow and flat. After the humbling loss against the Blues, it goes without saying the Avalanche’s defense needed to step it up and, of course, the team needed to get goals on the board.

Kurtis MacDermid took on Oleksiak just a few minutes into the period, no doubt policing the hit on Lehkonen in the last game. Unfortunately, it did little to ignite a fire within the team.

The lackadaisical play allowed the Kraken to net the first goal, making it 10 straight games of allowing an early deficit from this opponent.

pic.twitter.com/Ny6zSW8L5o

— Seattle Kraken (@SeattleKraken) November 14, 2023

Even though Colorado has had chances to adapt to Seattle’s playing style, it still causes problems for the team. The roster’s slump resulted in poor communication, inconsistent passing and missed power play opportunities, which had noticeable consequences.

The Avalanche only took five shots on goal in the first period, which was not a promising look for the remaining 40 minutes.

Second period

Though what was said in the locker room may never be known, the Avalanche entered the second frame with a new sense of determination and energy. Passes connected, communication improved and success followed.

Starting the period on a failed power play, the Avalanche kept pushing forward and consistently applied pressure to the home team. Mikko Rantanen broke through and netted his tenth goal of the season to tie the game 1–1. Nathan MacKinnon and Devon Toews assisted his goal.

Moose puts the finishing touches to find the back of the net! #GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/N7PmNMOdKF

— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) November 14, 2023

Finally being rewarded for hard work, it did not take long for the flood gates to open and for the burgundy and blue to remind the Seattle Kraken they were a tough contender.

Just a couple of minutes later, Ross Colton made the score 2–1 on a power play with help from Toews and Tomas Tatar.

Go-ahead goal from Ross the boss!#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/JmO2l26h27

— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) November 14, 2023

Third period

The final period of the contest was nothing less than exciting. Starting off on a historically successful penalty kill, the Avalanche maintained their lead and ensured the Kraken would not score another goal.

Quickly silencing enthusiastic boos from the crowd, Cale Makar made the score 3–1 with 15:46 left to go. He was assisted by Jones and Tatar.

Cale Makar puts the Avs up by 2!#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/rgGVmbO0Cy

— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights & News (@HockeyDaily365) November 14, 2023

The lineup on the ice in the final 30 minutes of the game could not have been more different from the one in the first 30.

Jonathan Drouin, new to the team this season, finally scored his first goal in an Avalanche jersey, assisted by Rantanen and MacKinnon. His goal was definitely a confidence booster after coming up short in the first 13 games.

Jonathan Drouin rips home MacKinnon's feed on the 2 on 1 to put the Avalanche up by 3!#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/gBZ5FofF8s

— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights & News (@HockeyDaily365) November 14, 2023

The team was on a roll, and everybody was cashing in. On a power play, Valeri Nichushkin scored the last goal of the game with just under five minutes to go and sealed the Kraken’s fate with a 5–1 defeat. MacKinnon had his third assist of the night, helped by Rantanen with his second.

Chugga Chugga Chu Chu #GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/H4B8BCzBMD

— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) November 14, 2023

The Kraken fired just one singular shot on the goal during the final frame.

Final takeaways

The team truly deserved the win. Despite a slow start and important players missing, the team triumphed and Jared Bednar reached 300 wins.

In total, Colorado had 31 shots to Seattle’s 19. The power play performance was significantly better than in recent games and converted on 2 of 6 chances.

Alexandar Georgiev’s recent performance has been questionable, but he was locked in and resembled the goalie Avs fans are accustomed to.

The get-right game could not have come at a better time. Returning home, Colorado will take on the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday before heading to Dallas for a division rivalry game.

The post Get-right game puts Avalanche back on track appeared first on The Rink.

Quick hits

— Seattle collapsed the middle of the ice. Any time the Avalanche tried to go up the center of the ice, the Kraken were there on the blue line waiting for them. It forced Colorado to work around the edges and took away the angle on the shot.

— Seattle took away the shooting lanes. The Kraken did a great job getting in front of shots throughout the entire game and blocked 22 shots. Colorado could only block 11 shots. Seattle did a much better job of taking the shooting lanes away and reducing the scoring chances.

— The physical game: Both teams brought the hits to the game, but Seattle was bordering on dangerous. Jamie Oleksiak pushed Artturi Lehkonen into the boards in the second period and he had to leave the game. Lehkonen is in a local hospital, and there is no update on his status.

Really scary play here. Lehkonen goes head-first into the boards after contact with Oleksiak. Just the smallest shove by Oleksiak threw him off balance. No penalty on the play.

Thankfully, Lehkonen was able to skate off, but he was moving very slowly and went down the tunnel. pic.twitter.com/uvtpRw5S7F

— Sound Of Hockey (@sound_hockey) November 10, 2023

— Just like their affiliate, the Colorado Eagles, the Avalanche failed to connect on the power play and it cost them the game. Colorado had three chances to get a goal on the power play, but did not convert on any. The Kraken converted one of their four chances.

— The top players for the Avalanche have stepped up offensively. Nathan MacKinnon said that the top players all needed to do a better job of getting the puck in the net. He, Bowen Byram and Valeri Nichushkin were all able to find the twine on Thursday night.

MacKinnon from Makar #GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/ImYugIo3dC

— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) November 10, 2023

We want Bo goals!#GoAvsGo pic.twitter.com/SiX55LJUZU

— x – Colorado Avalanche (@Avalanche) November 10, 2023

The Avalanche are now 8–4–0 after the 4–3 loss on Thursday. For some, that would seem like an impressive record, but for the Avalanche, they want more. When they lose a game, they are beating themselves up over the loss when they should step back and taking a breath to re-examine the loss. It is still early in the season, but every point will count later in the year. They are fighting back, but always seem to come up short.

Update on November 11th, 2023 11:25 am MT:

Lehkonen went to to the hospital with movement in all of his limbs and was alert and responsive. Per oaxh Bednar he will be out weeks.

The post Avs’ Lehkonen hospitalized in loss appeared first on The Rink.

The Avalanche did not take long to start the scoring even though the Kraken had their opportunities. Forward Nicolas Aube-Kubel beat former Avalanche goalie Philipp Grubauer (with the help of Carson Soucy running into his own netminder) at the 5:50 mark to give the Ball Arena crowd something to cheer about.

Following the Aube-Kubel goal, Grubauer put his net on lockdown for the rest of the first and most of the second period. A fortunate power play allowed wing Marcus Johansson to tie the game at 9:16, which held into the first intermission. The tight shot totals were 10–9 in favor of Seattle.

GRUUUUUUUUUUU pic.twitter.com/9GqItL8SP9

— ROOT SPORTS | NW (@ROOTSPORTS_NW) January 11, 2022

In the middle period, the Kraken came out shooting and brought a little luck with them. Jared McCann gave Seattle the lead on a bad-angle goal five minutes in, and Colin Blackwell gave them a two-goal lead 10 minutes later at the 14:20 mark.

Colorado cut the lead in half before the second intermission on Aube-Kubel’s second goal of the game with three minutes left in the second. Grubauer made 11 saves in the second period (some of them spectacular) to hold onto the elusive one-goal lead for the Kraken. He would be called upon in the third period even more, but his luck was not as good.

The Kraken’s bend-but-don’t-break defense finally gave way in the third period. Colorado peppered Grubauer with 14 shots, and goals by defenseman Devon Toews and Nazem Kadri snatched a victory from the jaws of defeat for the Avalanche. Toews’ goal was reviewed for a possible kicking motion, but eventually deemed good, which seemed to take the wind out of the Kraken sails.

Seattle could take a moral victory from this one, though, as they were heavy dogs coming in. They held the lead until late in the third and their goaltender played an excellent game. The final shot tallies were 35–24 in favor of Colorado.

Anchor points

I have been pretty hard on Grubauer (and for good reason), but I was really impressed with his play. He clearly came out with a little extra motivation to beat his former club and made some great saves. His team just left him fighting alone in the third period.

Another good sign for the Kraken was their power play breaking through in the first period with the Johansson goal and their penalty kill holding Colorado scoreless on three attempts.

The only Kraken line to have any success for the entire game was the Johansson-McCann-Jordan Eberle line, which was in the 60% range for Corsi and Fenwick. The Joonas Donskoi-Riley Sheahan-Alex Wennberg line was held to only three shots for and 10 against.

Soucy had a rough night, as he was directly responsible for two Avalanche goals. He ran into Grubauer on the first Aube-Kubel goal and inadvertently deflected the game tying Aube-Kubel goal into the net. He was on the ice for the Toews goal, as well.

Seattle was dominated in most possession metrics, but they focused on high-danger chances, which kept the game within their reach. Head Coach Dave Hakstol should take note and continue this approach. It never hurts to get the puck to the net and get some rebounds or redirections.

5-on-5 Corsi (total shot attempts) 58%–42%
5-on-5 Fenwick (Unblocked shot attempts) 58%–42%
5-on-5 High-danger chances for 56%–44%
5-on-5 Expected goals for 63%–37%
Face-off percentage 52%–48%

The Kraken have Tuesday off for travel but head to Texas to face the Dallas Stars on Wednesday night. The puck drop is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. PST.

The post RECAP: Kraken run out of steam in the third period against Avalanche appeared first on The Rink.

Colorado Avalanche at Seattle Kraken

The Avalanche came into Seattle riding a hot streak of three wins in a row, while the Kraken were plummeting down to the depths of the Puget Sound with a five-game losing streak.

Colorado took hold of Friday’s game almost immediately and never looked back. Head Coach Dave Hakstol finally gave a rest to struggling goaltender Philipp Grubauer, which meant that Chris Driedger was the sacrifice served up to the high-flying offense of the Avalanche. Things eventually got so bad that Grubauer ended up seeing action anyway.

The Avalanche came out firing on all cylinders, scoring two goals (one power play, one shorthanded) in the opening half of the first period and peppering Driedger with 11 shots. Seattle managed seven shots of their own, but were not able to chip away at the 2–0 Colorado lead. The power play goal was unassisted by Andre Burakovsky at the 4:04 mark and the shorthanded goal was two minutes later by Valeri Nichushkin with teammate Samuel Girard in the penalty box.

To say that the Kraken fell apart in the second period would be putting it lightly. Colorado scored four goals in the middle frame, on 14 shots, and drove the Kraken starting goaltender to the showers early. Young star Avalanche defenseman Cale Makar netted two goals, while Burakovsky scored another goal on the man advantage and Erik Johnson closed out the period with a goal to send the teams into intermission with a 6–0 Colorado lead.

All was not lost, though. Following the seventh goal by new Avalanche wing Nicolas Aube-Kubel, the Kraken showed some heart by not only breaking the shutout, but scoring three late goals to make the game a bit more respectable. Jordan Eberle scored a power play goal just a minute after the Aube-Kubel goal and Brandon Tanev scored a power play goal of his own three minutes later. Winger Colin Blackwell scored his first as a member of the Kraken in the final five minutes of play, which would be all the scoring on the night.

The teams filled up the box score with 10 total goals on 58 shots and a 7–3 Colorado win. Would the Kraken take this decimating loss and continue to plummet, or would they take their third period momentum and surprise the Washington Capitals?

Avalanche anchor points

Once again, the goaltending let the Kraken down. Driedger and Grubauer only saw 28 shots and only stopped 75%. At least Hakstol tried something different by starting Driedger. Thinking that “beating the bad” out of Grubauer was a wise idea just seemed nonsensical.

I hinted at this in the previous recap, but the Kraken are actually hot on the power play. Two more goals in this game gave them power play goals in the last three games and four in their last nine opportunities.

Defensemen Vince Dunn and Adam Larsson were on the ice for three Colorado goals after starting the season as the Kraken’s best possession pair and top 10 in the league.

As evidence by the final score, analytics were not in Seattle’s favor. Colorado led 5-on-5 in shot attempts (Corsi 55%–45%), unblocked shots (Fenwick 54%–46%), high-danger chances for (HDCF% 57%–43%) and expected goals for (xGF% 52%–88%). Seattle once again crushed their opponent at the faceoff dots, 63%–37%. Oddly enough, defensemen Jeremy Lauzon and Jamie Oleksiak had a phenomenal night analytically with a 70% Corsi.

Washington Capitals at Seattle Kraken

With a bit of a sour taste in their mouths, the Kraken hosted the high-scoring Capitals. Washington actually came in top five overall in goals for, which is considerably higher than the team that just put up seven goals on the Kraken two nights previous. They were also riding wins on back-to-back shutouts against the Los Angeles Kings and San Jose Sharks.

Seattle fans were probably not feeling very confident when the Capitals opened the scoring on a terrible Lauzon turnover 3:34 into the game. Lauzon failed to clear the puck behind his net, had the puck stolen and fed to a streaking Tom Wilson. Grubauer had little time to react to Wilson’s one-timer, and the visitors were up 1–0 early.

One of the biggest bright spots for the Kraken lately has been the power play, which lit the Seattle fire in this one. Jared McCann ripped a backhand shot over Kraken legend Vitek Vanecek’s shoulder on a scramble in close to tie the game late in the first period. It was essentially all Kraken from then on.

Even though there were only two goals scored in the first period, on 25 total shots, the second period went off the rails. The second was one of the most successful periods for the Kraken all season. Larsson and veteran Jaden Schwartz scored just 43 seconds apart, and Calle Jarnkrok scored his first goal as a member of the Kraken to open the flood gates for the home crowd. The three goals were scored on only nine Kraken shots on goal.

Clearly embarrassed by their awful second period showing, the Capitals came out in the third period on fire and peppered Grubauer with 23 shots on net. This time, though, the Kraken netminder shined. In what can be best described as a disastrous first 14 games, Grubauer showed the fans what General Manager Ron Francis went out and signed him for this summer, after he gave a soft one up to Alex Ovechkin three minutes into the period.

Based on the prior 14 games, most people watching probably got really concerned following the Ovechkin goal, but Grubauer shut the door and stopped the final 17 shots he faced.

Snake-bitten forward Yanni Gourde added a late empty-net goal, which gave the Climate Pledge Arena fans something to celebrate in a Sunday evening 5–2 win.

Capitals anchor points

This might be as close as we have gotten to a goalie win with the Kraken. Grubauer was the second star and stopped 37 of 39 shots. He held the usually dangerous Capitals power play unit scoreless on four opportunities. He would love to have that Ovechkin goal back, but the Wilson one can be piled on the head of pylon Lauzon.

Once again, the Kraken scored on the man advantage, taking advantage of their lone chance. This gives them five goals in their last 10 opportunities and power play goals in their last four games.

The possession and analytics numbers were split right down the middle. The 5-on-5 shot attempts (Corsi), unblocked shots (Fenwick) and expected goals for (xGF%) were slightly in favor of Washington 51%–49%. The high-danger chances for favored the Kraken (HDCF% 57%–43%). Washington also had a slight lead in face-off wins 52%-48%. The line of Eberle, Marcus Johansson and Alexander Wennberg held a positive Corsi percentage and Fenwick percentage over 75%. Dunn and Gourde had a rough night, giving up 18 and 17 shot attempts up, respectively.

The Kraken are off today and tomorrow but are back in action Wednesday night against the Carolina Hurricanes, who are no slouches. The puck drop is scheduled for 7 p.m. PST.

The post RECAP: Kraken split weekend with hot Avalanche and Capitals appeared first on The Rink.