Our preview asked whether Utah's power play could outscore its own penalty kill in Seattle. The power play did its half, with two goals on three chances, one from each unit. The kill gave both back, and the Kraken won 5-3. We'd put this loss on the penalty box. Utah was shorthanded four times, three of them for interference, and two of those calls came 94 seconds apart to give Seattle a 5-on-3. Philipp Grubauer stopped 29 of 30 even-strength shots, per the NHL box score. Against a goalie having that night, special teams were Utah's best way to win, and Utah handed the edge back.
Where the edge went
Vincent Trocheck tied it 1-1 on the power play at 17:57 of the first, a snap shot from about 16 feet off a feed from Kailer Yamamoto. Fifteen seconds later Kevin Stenlund went off for interference, and Matty Beniers deflected one in from about 6 feet 11 seconds into the penalty. The tie lasted 26 seconds.
The second period started worse. Yamamoto took an interference minor 31 seconds in, Jack McBain was called for tripping at 2:05, and Brandon Montour scored 18 seconds into the 5-on-3 with a slap shot from about 43 feet. That made it 3-1, and Utah needed more than 25 minutes of game time to get even. Lawson Crouse had taken the other interference call in the first, and that kill held.
So the preview's question came out even: two power-play goals for Utah, two for Seattle. The cushion we wrote about Thursday morning, the gap between what Utah's power play scores and what its kill allows, is the same size it was before the game. Utah's power play is now 15-for-39 on the season, 38.5 percent, still first in the NHL. Its kill is at 66.7 percent, tied for 29th. Seattle coach Lane Lambert didn't argue about his own kill. "It's hard to say we didn't kill poorly when we gave up two goals," he said in Jayd Serdy's recap on the Kraken's site.
André Tourigny liked what his power play did. "It's not just scoring, it's scoring when it matters, and they had big goals when it mattered," he said in the Mammoth's game story on NHL.com. That's fair. Seattle's power-play goals came when they mattered too. One fan in the r/Utah_Hockey post-game thread put the lesson plainly: "don't put yourself in a hole taking meaningless and avoidable penalties."
Five-on-five, apart from the goals
Take the penalties out and this was Utah's game on everything but the scoreboard. At five-on-five Utah out-attempted Seattle 56-33, outshot it 29-15, and had eight shots on goal from inside 25 feet to Seattle's two, by our count from the NHL's play-by-play. In all situations Utah outshot the Kraken 36-23 and outhit them 30-14.
Seattle still won five-on-five 2-1 on goals. Jordan Eberle scored on a slap shot from about 55 feet at 3:38 of the first. Mackie Samoskevich won it from about 11 feet at 14:35 of the third, six seconds after a Bobby McMann shot on goal. Logan Cooley's slap shot from about 51 feet at 7:42 of the third, his second goal of the night, was Utah's only five-on-five goal. Grubauer finished with 33 saves on 36 shots.
Tourigny's diagnosis was about decisions with the puck. "We did a lot of good stuff offensively, but we forced the play too much, and it's disappointing," he said in the same NHL.com story. Cooley said much the same in that story: "I thought we got the puck picked off a bunch of times and allowed them to transition." We'd take that as the room's honest read, and the numbers put a size on it. Whatever the turnovers cost, Seattle got 15 five-on-five shots on goal all night. It put seven on goal on the power play, and those seven scored as many goals as the 15.
Karel Vejmelka stopped 13 of 15 at even strength and 5 of 7 on the kill, per the box score. We didn't see the goals, and we won't grade them. The goalie argument is back in the post-game thread anyway, and we've made our case on Vejmelka in a separate post.
The two goals that came off
Both teams lost a goal to an offside challenge in the third, and the two cancel out. Early in the period Seattle challenged, and a Utah goal that would have tied it 3-3 came off because Barrett Hayton had gone into the zone ahead of the puck, per the NHL's coach's challenge page. The scorer was Yamamoto, by the account of Curtis Crabtree of FOX 13 Seattle. That gave Yamamoto an odd line: he set up the first power-play goal, took one of the two minors behind the 5-on-3, and had a goal wiped off, by Crabtree's account.
Cooley tied it 3-3 at 7:42 anyway. At 8:39 Utah challenged, and a Seattle goal that would have made it 4-3 came off for offside. Sound Of Hockey and FOX 13 Seattle both name McMann as the scorer. Six minutes later he assisted on Samoskevich's winner at 14:35, and Frederick Gaudreau added the empty netter at 19:00.
Grading our pick
We picked Utah 4, Seattle 3. Wrong winner, and Seattle scored two more than we gave it. The power play part held up: we said one goal was the least we'd expect and two was reasonable, and Utah got two. The rest of the miss we called ourselves. We wrote that if Utah was shorthanded four or more times, Seattle's power play would get enough looks to beat this kill twice. Utah was shorthanded four times, and the kill was beaten twice. Naming the way we could be wrong doesn't make it a good pick. We also wrote that whoever owned the first 20 minutes probably wouldn't have to chase. Seattle led 2-1 after one period, with a 10-8 edge in shots, and Utah chased the rest of the night.
Utah is 7-4-0 with 14 points and still first in the Central, ahead of Minnesota's 14 on regulation wins, 7 to 6. It's fourth in the West. Tampa Bay comes to the Delta Center on Saturday at 7:00 p.m. MT (schedule). The power play doesn't need fixing. Fewer than four trips to the box would be a start.
Tusks up.
Sources: NHL.com box score and play-by-play (shot locations and strength splits are our analysis of the NHL's data, so treat distances as approximate); NHL standings and team stats; the NHL's coach's challenge page; the Mammoth's game story on NHL.com by Catherine Bogart; Jayd Serdy's recap on the Kraken's site; Curtis Crabtree, FOX 13 Seattle; Darren Brown, Sound Of Hockey; the r/Utah_Hockey post-game thread; our preview.