Even the architect of this streaking Kraken squad admits he never envisioned building something that could deliver results this good, this quickly.
Kraken general manager Ron Francis had remained behind to scout college games in Boston while his team traveled to Chicago and beat the Blackhawks on Saturday night for a franchise-record eighth consecutive win. Beyond becoming the first team in NHL history to sweep a road trip of at least seven games, the Kraken opened Sunday with the best points percentage in the entire Western Conference.
And while Francis still sees areas for improvement a game beyond the campaign’s halfway mark, he can’t quibble much with a 26-12-4 team looking like an offensive juggernaut and just one win away from equaling last season’s total.
“Going in, you hope things are going to go well,” he said. “But I don’t know if anybody kind of saw us being where we are now.”
The Kraken entered Sunday tied with Los Angeles for second place in the Pacific Division, two points behind leader Vegas with two games in hand. Their wins have included first-timers against several clubs, leaving Monday afternoon’s Climate Pledge Arena visitors, the reigning three-time Eastern Division champion Tampa Bay Lightning, as the only franchise the Kraken haven’t registered a point against.
Francis listed his forwards as the biggest surprise, the Kraken leading the NHL in goals scored in 5-on-5 play with 116 — 10 ahead of second place New Jersey. They were tied for second with Boston at 158 goals overall and their league-leading 97 road goals tops next-best Edmonton’s by a dozen.
That’s for a team fourth worst in scoring last season with 2.60 goals per game compared to 3.77 this season. The Kraken have received contributions from all four of their forward lines and two defensive pairings, to where bottom-line winger Daniel Sprong’s 14 goals are seven more than that by major summertime acquisition Oliver Bjorkstrand and two more than free agent signee and co-points-leader Andre Burakovsky’s total.
“Sprong, he’s been a nice surprise,” Francis said of a player acquired at the trade deadline last March. “Bjorkstrand, I think he’s been a little snakebit and he’s playing a little better than his numbers probably indicate. I really like his smartness and his stickwork and a lot of things.”
The Kraken have 11 players with at least seven goals, tops in the league.
Francis said the insertion of Calder Trophy front-runner Beniers and Burakovsky — both tied for the team lead in points at 36 — Bjorkstrand and Sprong, plus injury returnees Brandon Tanev and Jaden Schwartz has been akin to landing six new forwards among the starting 12. Recent waiver pickup Eeli Tolvanen — who has five goals and two assists in eight games — is another Kraken forward that wasn’t here a year ago.
And holdover Jared McCann leads the Kraken with 22 goals, on pace to exceed his team-high 27 from last season.
“We’re better at being able to maintain the puck and create opportunities in the offensive zone,” Francis said. “We’re obviously better in scoring goals. So, a lot of positives.”
Yet, questions linger about an offense scoring on an NHL-high percentage of shots taken — usually a sign of some luck. Analytics website Money Puck lists the Kraken with 25.68 more goals than “expected” based on shot quality — nearly double the 14.75 by next-highest Vancouver.
McCann led the team with 14.5 goals more than expected while Beniers was second at 6.2. The fact both specialize in one-timed shots would likely account for a higher percentage of some going in, but the overall team numbers appear somewhat inflated.
Throw in a power play only 18th of 32 teams at 21.1% efficiency and there’s reason to doubt the Kraken sustaining this offensive pace. That appears to make it imperative players maintain the “defense first” mindset preached by coach Dave Hakstol in lieu of trying to score opponents into submission.
The Kraken penalty kill also ranked second worst in the league at 68.7% — a liability that could become more pronounced as the season gets deeper.
“The penalty-kill is kind of struggling and now we’ve made some little adjustments to try to settle it down,” Francis said. “So, that’s an area we can continue to work on for sure.”
On goaltending, Francis admits “the underlying numbers are probably not as strong as you’d like them to be” but “we’re finding ways to win games.”
Where the Kraken a season ago were the NHL’s worst at allowing more goals than “expected” based on shot quality, they’re now around league average. The Evolving Hockey analytics website had Martin Jones with a Goals Saved Above Expected (GSAx) stat of minus-0.77 and Philipp Grubauer at a plus-0.01 — which is much better than last season, when Grubauer yielded a league-worst 31.53 more goals than expected.
Money Puck had things slightly different, with Jones saving 1.2 more goals than expected, while Grubauer had allowed 0.5 more.
But those are still right around baseline with both goalies mostly stopping shots they’re supposed to. The team’s save percentage of .890 ranks only 25th, but is improving with Jones at .938 or higher in five of his past seven games while Grubauer has been at .914 or better in three of his past five.
“The one thing that’s so different with the goaltending is we haven’t let the weak one go in, or the bad goal,” Francis said. “We’ve been better in that regard and on some nights when we’ve needed it we’ve been able to outscore the opponent.”
The Kraken are 19-4-3 when holding opponents to fewer than 30 shots, which they’ve done six times this win streak.
Francis said he’s been impressed by Jones of late, but doesn’t yet know which goalie will start most down the stretch.
“If you have two guys playing well, it’s a huge advantage,” he said. “How many teams have gotten into the playoffs and have lost because of an injury to the goaltender? Or the guy they thought they were banking on starts to struggle and they can’t overcome that? So, the more guys we have playing well the better and goaltending is no different from that.”
And the fact the Kraken are even talking playoffs this late — let alone positioning for a run at a division title — may be the biggest first-half surprise.
“There’s been a lot of changes and a lot of new faces,” Francis said. “You never know how quickly it’s going to mesh but obviously, it’s much quicker than I thought.”