PHILADELPHIA — Big players delivering in big games has been a long-running sports theme that the Kraken began utilizing more to their advantage over the weekend.
The players propelling Sunday’s pivotal 4-3 win over the Flyers were primarily those the Kraken pay and depend on for offense. Jordan Eberle, Jaden Schwartz, Jared McCann and Oliver Bjorkstrand earn four of the five highest team salaries for position players not on injured reserve, and all came up big against the Flyers in a victory the struggling Kraken desperately needed.
All except McCann have had extended stretches without goals this season. And a Kraken team that’s benefitted enormously from bottom-line contributions will likely need increasingly more from their bigger-name forwards in the wake of an injury that’s expected to sideline Andre Burakovsky for weeks.
“I’ve had stretches where I haven’t scored in quite a lot,” Eberle, who leads the team with 40 points, said with a chuckle after Sunday’s victory. “And then you have stretches where things go. So you just kind of stick to the same things, and as you’re getting chances eventually one’s going to go in.”
One did go in for Eberle on Sunday after a nice pass from McCann off a 2-on-1 break. The goal was Eberle’s first since Jan. 10 and got the Kraken even on the scoreboard in an opening period they’d largely dominated.
“We’ve seen that before between those two,” Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said. “They have pretty good chemistry, whether it’s off the rush or even in the zone — finding each other from below the goal line into the scoring area.”
And the Kraken undoubtedly would like to see more of that.
Since defeating the Chicago Blackhawks exactly a month ago Tuesday, the Kraken in 11 games have seen their six highest-paid forwards combine for just nine goals. That includes Burakovsky and Yanni Gourde, who hasn’t scored since Jan. 10.
That’s as many goals as the nine scored individually by waiver-wire pickup Tolvanen since his Jan. 1 Kraken debut. So when scrutinizing aspects of the Kraken’s slowed play in going 4-6-1 since their franchise-record eight-game win streak ended, the need for big offensive names to come up bigger looms large.
Bjorkstrand helped give the Kraken a lead by Sunday’s first intermission, stripping the puck and allowing Tolvanen to race in and score right before period’s end. Bjorkstrand was acquired by trade from Columbus last summer and was expected to be among the Kraken’s offensive leaders.
Instead, he’d been relegated to third-line duty, drawing praise more for defensive contributions. But after scoring Friday night in New York, six of his 10 goals have come since Jan. 1, and he has seven points his past seven games.
Schwartz, much like Eberle, had gone a month without scoring since a Jan. 12 game but then popped a couple Sunday to provide the Kraken needed cushion to hold off a late Flyers charge.
When the Kraken signed Schwartz to a five-year free agent deal in July 2021, the idea was he’d be an offensive leader with a penchant for generating chances down low near the net. But staying on the ice was his biggest issue last season due to a hand injury and a different, undisclosed condition that may be the same one that recently sidelined him for four weeks before his return this trip.
“I’ve had some practices and a few games under my belt,” Schwartz said after the Philadelphia game. “When you’re out, you can do as much as you can in the gym and on the ice, but nothing feels the same as it does when you’re actually in a game.”
Schwartz has appeared in 81 games since his signing, scoring 20 goals and adding 28 assists. Those would be decent single-season totals — albeit in this case compiled over about 1 2/3 actual campaigns — so the issue is Schwartz remaining in the lineup to have an impact.
Goals leader McCann has 24 and has kept producing at numbers befitting the five-year contract extension he received last March. But even he’s seen totals cool somewhat this recent rough patch, scoring just twice in 11 games since his hat trick in Chicago — one of those coming Friday against the Rangers.
One danger, as was the case last season, would be for teams to zero in on McCann as the primary, or even lone Kraken scoring threat and pay additional attention to stopping him. That becomes easier with Burakovsky sidelined and if other top Kraken performers aren’t producing.
Also, some unexpected sources previously sustaining the offense have started to slow down.
Calder Trophy favorite Matty Beniers hasn’t scored in a month since the Chicago game and notably hasn’t logged a point since being blindsided by a cheap shot from Vancouver Canucks defenseman Tyler Myers before the All-Star break.
None of that is Beniers’ fault, but a decline in production from a rookie who’d generated more offense than expected means others must fill the void.
Fourth-line winger Daniel Sprong had stunned by passing even Burakovsky in goals with his 12th and 13th against Ottawa and Montreal on Jan. 8 and 9. But Sprong has just two goals since and none in his past eight contests after netting his 15th against Edmonton.
Nobody expects Sprong to carry the offensive load, particularly Hakstol — who’s been imploring the winger to focus on his defensive game. And sure, the 12 goals from Ryan Donato and nine from Tolvanen have offset some declines.
But neither fits the descriptor of an offensive catalyst for a playoff-bound team.
Which means, unless general manager Ron Francis adds some big-ticket scoring by the March 3 NHL trade deadline, the Kraken will likely be counting more than ever on the bigger names already in house to increase their production.