If the PWHL wants to show off how entertaining its product can be,
all they need do is bottle today’s Seattle Kraken-Toronto Scepters game,
the league’s highest-scoring contest of the season. What a show!
The Toronto Scepters suffered a series of travel nightmares in the days leading up to their arrival in Seattle, including more than six hours on an airport runway. So it makes sense they were anxious for a fast start against the Torrent on Tuesday at Climate Pledge Arena.
Before the Torrent knew what hit them, goals by Blayre Turnbull and Jesse Compher put them in a 2-0 hole. The good news was that there were still 57 minutes left to play.
By the end of the 1st period, goals by Hilary Knight on the power play and Hanna Bilka’s team-leading 6th had drawn Seattle even.
Seattle added goals from Julia Gosling, Lexie Adzija shorthanded, Megan Carter and Jessie Eldridge to outlast the Scepters, 6-4 before 10,160 thoroughly satisfied – and probably exhausted – fans. Eldridge recorded a pair of assists for a three-point night. The teams combined for 68 shots on goal; 33 for Seattle, 35 for Toronto.
Scepter With Style
The image below is NOT one of the Torrent. On Scepters social media, we noted the entrance of captain Blayre Turnbull. A friend of Seattle Kraken assistant coach Jessica Campbell, Turnbull sported a Kraken jersey with “Soupy” on the nameplate. (Campbell, “Soupy,” get it?)
Campbell was in attendance to watch the game.
1st Period
Toronto breaks on top just 1:18 after puck drop. Seattle defender Anna Wilgren gets burned on a pinch at the left point. Scepters captain Turnbull, she of the Kraken jersey, calls her own number on a 2-on-1, firing past Corinne Schroeder.
The visitors double their lead 1:36 later. Jesse Compher is left alone at the top of the crease, making it simple work to convert Daryl Watts’ centering pass from the near boards.
Seattle coach Steve O’Rourke marveled before the game how veterans Knight and Alex Carpenter keep the team on an even keel, whether Seattle is winning or losing. The pair did more than that on a Torrent power play. Carpenter found Bilka down low; Bilka slid a no-look backhand pass between her legs, across the crease for Knight to slam home her 2nd of the season at 9:52.
Seattle had been held scoreless on their prior 17 power plays. Bilka added a goal to her spectacular assist at 13:49, redirecting a Cayla Barnes centering pass. The play was a give-and-go, as Bilka had entered the zone, passed to Barnes, and busted down the slot, so the Torrent defender could return the favor.
Of course Bilka and Barnes work well together; they’re roommates. The pair were previously college teammates at Ohio State, where they won a national championship.
Scepters goalie Raygan Kirk made a remarkable blocker save on Carpenter or Seattle would have taken the lead. Not only goals but shots in the period were also even, 12 apiece.
2nd Period
This is the Torrent’s final home game before the Olympic break. From Seattle, those headed to Italy includes Team USA’s Cayla Barnes, Hannah Bilka, Alex Carpenter and Hilary Knight. Julia Gosling will skate for Team Canada, and Aneta Tejralová for Team Czechia. “We rely on our Olympians,” coach O’Rourke said earlier.
Schroeder’s best save tonight, sliding post-to-post to rob Maggie Connors.
Torrent defender Lyndie Lobdell lofts the kind of usually-harmless wrist shot from the blueline you see all the time. But here’s the reason for usually-harmless wrist shots from the blueline. This one was tipped in route from the high slot by Julia Gosling, changing direction just enough to elude Kirk for a 3-2 Seattle lead at 4:21.
Soon after, Gosling has a blueline-in breakaway, but Kirk closes the 5-hole in time.
When Lobdell is called for delay of game, Schroeder makes a dynamic point-blank save on Natalie Spooner. But she can’t stop Kali Flanagan’s drive down the slot through a mass of bodies in front (which may have ticked off the stick of Torrent defender Emily Brown). Toronto ties the game 3-3 on the PP at 10:30.
Toronto’s Sara Hjalmarsson knocks down Barnes behind the Seattle net. Fans aren’t done with their “Ref you s**k” chant when their opinion improves somewhat – the Scepters Claire Dalton is whistled for high sticking. The Torrent press, but don’t break the tie. Shots after 40 favor Seattle, 25-23.
3rd Period
1:45 in, Gosling goes off for hooking. No worries – Lexie Adzija scores shorthanded. Because of the PWHL’s “Jailbreak” rule, the goal at not only gives Seattle a 4-3 lead, it erases the Gosling minor.
Truculence. Adzija roughs, Toronto’s Allie Munroe cross-checks, the teams come together, and we’ll play the next two minutes 4-on-4.
Observation: good on the fans; these Torrent crowds don’t need much reason to raise the roof. The most routine of Schroeder saves is met with an enthusiastic roar. Speaking of opportunities to roar…
A wild sequence. Spooner and Danielle Serdachny have a massive collision at the Seattle blueline that sends both players flying. Almost in the same instant, Toronto’s Compher trips over the prone Serdachny. The upshot is that the Torrent’s Jessie Eldridge heads up right wing on a 2-on-1. Defender Megan Carter takes the pass and finishes for a 5-3 Seattle lead at 5:26.
Moments after Renata Fast puts a vicious but legal shoulder check into Mikyla Grant-Mentis, Toronto draws back within 5-4 on a Spooner goal at 8:10.
Eldridge, on a breakaway with 1:46 left, put the final exclamation point on a game with a bushel of them.
Up Next
Seattle took the first-ever meeting between these teams, 3-2 in a shootout, in a Jan. 3 Takeover Tour game at Hamilton, Ont. The teams will play again at CPA on Feb. 27, and in Toronto on Mar. 15.
In a bit of unfortunate scheduling, the Torrent will be dropping the puck on another Takeover Tour game Sunday while the Seahawks are playing the Rams for the right to represent the NFC in the Super Bowl. And where will the Torrent’s game against fellow expansionists Vancouver Goldeneyes take place? In Denver, on the same day the Broncos host the Patriots for the AFC Championship.