Oilers’ early goals topple Kraken

Heading into the 2021-2022 season, most hockey followers agreed that the Edmonton Oilers’ Connor McDavid was the best player in the National Hockey League. Certainly, the league’s Most Valuable Player a year ago ranks as the top offensive force – he has 18 points in nine contests this season after recording over 100 points in a 56-game season.

Therefore, it was a little frustrating to the Seattle Kraken, `holding’ the league’s best player to one assist and still dropping a 5-2 decision to the Oilers in their first-ever visit to Edmonton’s Rogers Place. While some question if the Oilers have the overall depth to win the Stanley Cup, they also have the second-leading scorer in the league – Leon Draisaitl, a former MVP himself. The Cologne, Germany native scored two goals in the first 6:01 of last night’s contest and later added two assists as the Oilers improve to 7-1-1 on the season. Seattle drops to 3-6-1.

For better or worse, the Kraken seemed to follow the same script as recent games – a slow start that includes giving up the first goal, followed by a solid second period and then falling short of victory in the final stanza. But the team continues to get good goaltending, this time from Joey Daccord, the 25-year-old making only his second start of the season. While Daccord gave up five goals on 23 shots, he made some nice saves, including a couple on Draisaitl who could have more goals. With Edmonton on a power play, Daccord made a diving save on Draisaitl as the second period expired.

Another positive – Jaden Schwartz, expected to be a top-six forward – picked up his first goal of the season (he’s also had more assists lately). After Draisaitl’s first goal gave Edmonton the lead two minutes into the contest, Schwartz tied the game less than two minutes later. Schwartz took a stretch pass from Yanni Gourde, won a battle for the puck with Oilers’ defenseman Darnell Nurse at the blue line and went in for the score. The biggest negative; the Kraken had four power-play opportunities but were unable to score. Seattle has only three goals on 33 attempts with a man advantage, a stat even scarier than some of the costumes at Climate Pledge Arena on Halloween night.

“We had good chances tonight. We had good chances off the rush and off of some good offensive zone opportunities, and a couple that went off posts (three) and one through the crease,” Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said. “That’s the way it’s gone for us the last couple of nights, but we have to push and find ways to change that. We pushed real hard the last two nights. I look at tonight, and typically in back-to-backs, I thought we started a little bit slow. It took us seven or eight minutes to get our legs going. Once we did, I liked the end of the first and the second-period push was excellent.”

Defenseman Carson Soucy had the Kraken’s second goal. Soucy, who’s been alternating with Haydn Fleury as Seattle’s sixth defenseman lately, joined the rush and scored off a centering pass from Nathan Bastian. The goal was Soucy’s second of the season.

Draisaitl’s first goal was a bit of a fluke. Defenseman Tyson Barrie fired from the point and the puck went off the side of Draisaitl’s skate and into the net. After Schwartz’s tying marker, Draisaitl scored on a nice pass in close from Zach Hyman, the Oilers’ off-season acquisition from Toronto. Draisaitl almost scored his third goal of the game six minutes into the first period. He fired a slap shot that was kicked out by Daccord.

Duncan Keith, the 38-year-old defensemen who played on three Stanley Cup champions with the Chicago Blackhawks, scored on a rebound to increase Edmonton’s lead to 3-1 at 1:47 of the second period. It was Keith’s 1200^th NHL game. Kyle Turris and Kailer Yamamoto, a Spokane native who also played for the Spokane Chiefs of the Western Hockey League, completed the Edmonton scoring in the third period.

Mikko Koskinen had 27 saves for the Oilers. Mike Smith expected to be Edmonton’s starting goalkeeper, has been injured most of the season. Koskinen, a 6-7 netminder from Finland, has five wins between the pipes for the Oilers.

“It’s frustrating, the last game was right there for us and so was tonight,” Schwartz said. “They were opportunistic to start. We had a lot of good chances, a lot of good looks, and we just have to find ways to put them in the back of the net, get hungrier around the net, and our power play has to start executing better for us and getting us on the board and getting us more momentum. We keep losing the special teams battles, which doesn’t help. There’s positives that we’re doing well, and we have to do it well and we have to start finding ways to win.”

GAME NOTES

* The Kraken were once again without forward Jared McCann and assistant coach Paul McFarland, who both went into COVID-19 Protocol Sunday morning. Despite missing the last two games, McCann remains the Kraken’s leading scorer with seven points – three goals and four assists.

*  Brandon Tanev (six goals, no assists) and captain Mark Giordano (two goals, four assists) are second on the team with six points. Tanev leads the Kraken in plus/minus with a +5. Some old-time fans don’t like this statistic but players are credited with a plus every time they’re on the ice when their team scores at even strength and a minus when a goal is scored against the team.

* The Oilers honored Kraken defenseman Adam Larsson with a video that played on the Jumbotron scoreboard. Larsson spent five seasons as a member of the Oilers. He was the New Jersey Devils first-round pick (fourth overall and first European) in the 2011 entry draft as an 18-year-old out of Skellefea, Sweden. He was traded to Edmonton in 2016 for Taylor Hall, another former MVP.

* The Kraken have faced 2020-21 award winners in their last three games – Minnesota’s Kapril Kaprizov (Calder Trophy, top rookie), the Rangers’ Adam Fox (Norris, top defenseman) and McDavid (Hart, MVP). Seattle could face Chicago’s Marc-Andre Fleury later this month (Nov. 17 at Climate Pledge) who won the Vezina Trophy for best goalie.

* Current Edmonton coach Dave Tippett may have been the Kraken’s first employee. After a long tenure as coach of the Phoenix Coyotes, Tippett was hired as a senior advisor by the Kraken ownership group. He served in that capacity from June 2018 to May 2019 before becoming head coach of the Oilers.

* After their brief trip to Edmonton, the Kraken return home for a game with the Buffalo Sabres on Thursday night. That should be an interesting contest as the Sabres, who were expected to be one of the worst teams in the league currently reside in second place in the Atlantic Division with a 5-2-1 record.

GAME SUMMARY

1^ST Period

E – Leon Draisaitl (Tyson Barrie) 2:12.

S – Jaden Schwartz (Yanni Gourde, Mark Giordano) 4:09

E – Draisaitl (Zach Hyman, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins) 6:01.

2^nd Period

E – Duncan Keith (Connor McDavid, Draisaitl) 1:47.

S   Carson Soucy (Jamie Oleksiak, Nathan Bastian) 18:40

3^rd Period

E – Kyle Turris (Devin Shore) 2:57

E – Kailer Yamamoto (Draisaitl) 12:22

Goals/Saves -S: Joey Daccord 5-18. E: Mikko Koskinen 2-27.

Penalties – Seattle 4-8. Edmonton 4-8.

Referees – Tom Chmielewski, Jake Brenk. Linesmen – Brandon Gawryletz, Jonathan Deschamps.