It’s an interconference battle on the ice as a pair of teams looking to earn a victory take the ice in the Steel City. The Seattle Kraken are on the road as they make the trip east to face the Pittsburgh Penguins Saturday night. Seattle comes in off a 4-0 blanking of Minnesota on the road Thursday night in their previous contest. Pittsburgh was dropped 6-3 on the road by Buffalo Wednesday night in the second game of a back-to-back situation. In the three previous meetings between the franchises, the Kraken own a 2-1 advantage, including a 3-1 home victory in the first matchup this season back on October 29.
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Seattle ran their win streak to three games as they took care of business against Minnesota on the wild Thursday night. The Kraken entered Friday 6-4-2 and tied for second in the Pacific Division with Edmonton, six points behind Vegas for the top spot in the division. Seattle entered Friday’s action 9th in the league in goals for at 3.50 goals per contest on the season. The Kraken are 18th in the league in goals against as they give up an average of 3.17 goals per game this season. Seattle is 5th in power play success as they cash in on a solid 27.9% of their opportunities with the man advantage. The Kraken are a dismal 27th in penalty kill rate in the early going as they have gotten through only 71.8% of their shorthanded situations successfully.
Against Minnesota, Seattle was solid offensively and slammed the door on Minnesota’s normally pr olific offense to run their win streak to three games. The Kraken held a 6-4 edge in shots on goal in the opening period but neither team was able to put the puck in the net, leaving things scoreless after 20 minutes of play. In the second period, Seattle was outshot by a 12-8 margin but outscored Minnesota 3-0 to lead by that margin at the second intermission. Morgan Geekie gave the Kraken the only goal they would need with his fourth goal of the season at 5:02 off assists from Daniel Sprong and Ryan Donato. Jamie Oleksiak made it a 2-0 game with his third of the year at 11:34 off assists from Yanni Gourde and Justin Schultz. Alex Wennberg extended to a 3-0 margin with his second goal of the year, on the power play, at 14:47 with assists going to Sprong and Oliver Bjorkstrand. Seattle held a 9-6 edge in shots in the third period and scored the only goal of the stanza to secure the win. Wennberg tallied his second of the game and third of the year at 10:35 with assists going to Will Borgen and Bjorkstrand to close the scoring. Martin Jones made 22 saves in the shutout for the Kraken, who held a 23-22 edge in shots on goal, for the victory. He’s expected to get the start in goal for this contest.