Kraken jump out to 1-0 series lead with OT win over Stars
DALLAS — Six weeks and a playoff eternity ago in this building, the Kraken blew a late two-goal lead and needed overtime to salvage two points that seemed theirs for most of the contest.
That same script unfolded again in Tuesday night’s second round playoff opener at American Airlines Center, including Yanni Gourde continuing his team’s postseason magic by finding the winner in the extra session. Gourde’s turnaround shot after a goal-mouth scramble at 12:17 of overtime gave the Kraken a 5-4 victory and a fourth playoff road victory in five tries this post season.
“That’s how you want to start the series,” Gourde, the fifth different Kraken scorer on the night, said after the wild finish. “It’s going to be. tough series. We know how good and strong they are, so it’s a huge game getting that first one.”
The Kraken lead this best-of-seven Western Conference semifinal 1-0 with Game 2 right back here on Thursday night.
For the longest time, just as in the regular season game, a Kraken victory seemed in the bag far earlier.
But the Kraken couldn’t finish numerous chances to add to a two-goal lead before Joe Pavelski, in his first game back after suffering a concussion in the first-round opener against Minnesota, scored midway through the third and again three minutes later. Pavelski’s tying strikes capped a special four-goal night for him that had the crowd in a frenzy and the Kraken scrambling in circles in the game’s closing minutes.
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“I loved our response, I loved our composure and I loved our poise,” Gourde said. “We’re a pretty mature group in there and we trusted that the process was going to get it done. Keep working, keep at it and eventually we’re going to get our break and we got it there.”
Justin Schultz, Oliver Bjorkstrand, Jaden Schwartz and Jordan Eberle also scored for the Kraken, who looked for most of the night as if they’d steal this opener. Schultz, Bjorkstrand and Eberle struck for a trio of first-period goals in just 52 seconds against standout Dallas netminder Oettinger — who looked shaky throughout the frame in a rare display of vulnerability.
It seemed a gift for a Kraken team coming off a draining seven-game series win over the Colorado Avalanche and that seemed in for a handful against the well-rested Stars.
Pavelski had just scored his second goal of the opening period to give Dallas a 2-1 lead when the Kraken kicked the roof in on Oettinger. Two minutes after Pavelski’s go-ahead goal, Schultz and Bjorkstrand struck pay dirt just 11 seconds apart on shots to Oettinger’s blocker side to restore the Kraken’s lead.
Then, before the stunned crowd could figure out what was happening, the Kraken came back down the ice and saw Eberle redirect a Vince Dunn wrist shot from the left point that also found the back of the net.
The Kraken pumped four goals past Oettinger on their first 11 shots.
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“We had a pretty good first period and obviously, we were pretty opportunistic there,” Schwartz said. “We did a good job of staying with it. We were coming out being aggressive, putting pucks on net and getting some traffic there. It was kind of a wild first period but i thought we were on our toes and being aggressive.”
That 4-2 lead held up and the Kraken in the final period would miss several golden opportunities to put the game away. The biggest came when Matty Beniers was staring at a wide-open right side of the net but rang his shot off the post with Oettinger out of position.
“He’s a world class goalie, so anytime you’re playing against a guy like that, you’ve got to get traffic,” Schwartz said. “Take his eyes away as much as you can. We had a couple of bice shots too. Guys were picking the corners.”
Oettinger had entered with a stellar .926 save percentage this postseason and a reputation as a big-time playoff goalie, courtesy of his near first-round upset of the Calgary Flames a year ago when he kept his team in a Game 7 overtime thriller. He’d made an early stop from point-blank range off Beniers just moments before Pavelski skated down the ice, took a pass in the right circle and fired a puck past Philipp Grubauer to open the scoring just 2:25 into the game.
It was the first time this postseason the Kraken had failed to open the scoring after doing so in all seven games against Colorado before ousting the defending champions in Game 7 on Sunday. But the Kraken kept things fundamentally sound after the early setback and Schwartz would even the score with 8:35 to go in the frame off a net-front feed by Morgan Geekie — beating Oettinger between the pads from very close range.
And even though Pavelski would give Dallas the lead back 53 seconds later, it would take only two minutes before Schultz wristed a puck past Oettinger’s blocker to get the Kraken’s scoring flurry started.
Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said he felt the team had “heavy legs” at times — especially during the difficult third period finish — as a carry over from the tough Colorado series. But he’d expected it coming in and also knew the team’s “rhythm” from playing every other day might be enough to offset the tired legs and counter a Dallas team working on extended rest.
“I guess at the end of the day the tradeoffs were there,” Hakstol said. “There were some heavy legs but we also continued with some of the good feeling we came out of Game 7 with.”
Source: The Seattle Times
