Down In A Hole: Kraken 8, Blackhawks 5

It was over within the first 20 minutes.

Unable to climb out of a six-goal deficit suffered in the first 20 minutes of the game, the Chicago Blackhawks were defeated 8-5 by the Seattle Kraken on Saturday night.

It wasn’t a new site, but it was frustrating nonetheless.

The Kraken opened the scoring 2:50 into the first period. On the rush, Morgan Geekie sent a nice pass to Daniel Sprong, who made a nice move to score, giving the Kraken a 1-0 lead.

The Blackhawks tied the game at one a couple of minutes later after Jonathan Toews threw a backdoor feed that deflected off Jamie Oleksiak’s stick and into the net.

Unfortunately, the Kraken would then proceed to score five goals on their next six shots in less than a five-minute span.

First, Matty Beniers got the puck up top from Vince Dunn and wired a shot into the back of the net, putting the Kraken up 2-1 at 9:30 of the first period.

Second, less than a minute later, Jared McCann extended the Kraken’s lead to 3-1 after skating into the circle on a rush and firing a shot in on the far side of the net, past Petr Mrazek.

Next, Andre Burakovsky buried a slick no-look feed from Beniers for the fourth Kraken goal of the first period.

Then, Eeli Tolvanen put the Kraken up 5-1 as he slammed home Yanni Gourde’s pass on the rush at 12:45 of the period.

Finally, Ryan Donato whipped a cross-ice pass to Jared McCann, who scored cleanly from the right circle, making it 6-1 Kraken at the at the 13:11 mark of the first period.

The Blackhawks got one back 10:45 into the second period off of Isaak Phillips’ first NHL goal. The blue-line prospect backhanded Jason Dickinson’s return feed off the rush past Martin Jones to make it 6-2.

The Blackhawks added another to make it 6-3 just 51 seconds into the third period as Max Domi’s wrist shot on the power play found its way through traffic and past Jones.

The Kraken made it 7-3 as McCann roofed the puck from the top of the right circle, completing his hat trick 1:54 into the final frame.

Just 43 seconds later, Oliver Bjorkstrand buried Oleksiak’s centering pass to make it 8-3 Kraken:

The Blackhawks added two late goals. Taylor Raddysh had the first one:

For the second one, Max Domi stole the puck behind the net and set up Patrick Kane, who finished from the slot.

And so, the Blackhawks fell 8-5 to the Kraken — not surprising, but still embarrassing.

Notes

• At least Phillips got his first NHL goal? And it was a pretty backhand, that’s for sure.
• Look, there’s not really much to say about games like this. Mrazek was terrible, allowing six goals on seven shots, and Stalock wasn’t his best, but the team in front was missing coverage, there were tons of defensive breakdowns, and the team was generally out of sorts throughout most of the game — especially the first period. It’s not like Seattle was overwhelmingly better in terms of puck possession, but the Blackhawks made too many systematic mistakes against a well-oiled scoring team that was bound to score plenty of goals in this game. The Blackhawks being able to score five themselves is more a testament to Jones not being particularly good in net either, rather than the Blackhawks’ own scoring prowess.
• I’m going to just leave a couple post-game comments here instead of more of my own notes. From Luke Richardson, Domi, and Toews:

Game Charts

Three stars

1. Jared McCann (SEA) — 3 goals
2. Matty Beniers (SEA) — 1 goal, 1 assist
3. Max Domi (CHI) — 1 goal, 1 assist

What’s next

The Blackhawks get a couple of days off to lick their wounds before facing the Buffalo Sabres Tuesday at the United Center at 7:30 p.m.