A challenging off-season began for the Seattle Kraken at 10:12 pm Pacific Time Tuesday, the moment the final horn at Climate Pledge Arena signaled the end to the 2024-25 season.
In the curtain-closer, Seattle showed plenty of offense: a shorthanded Tye Kartye goal, a power play marker by Brandon Montour, Jaden Schwartz’s team-leading 26th, Matty Beniers’ 20th on the PP, and Eeli Tolvanen in the final minute. It wasn’t quite enough. Lax defense contributed to two goals in each period for the L.A. Kings as they held on for a season-ending 6-5 victory.
Seattle finished its first campaign under coach Dan Bylsma with a 35-41-6 record and 76 points, 7th in the eight-team Pacific Division. For the third time in four tries all-time, the Kraken fell short of a playoff berth.
At a Kraken Community Iceplex season ticket holder event earlier Tuesday, CEO Tod Leiweke promised, “No big summer vacations for anyone, because we have a long list to do.” Leiweke said the start of that list will be announced “in the next couple of weeks.”
2025 NHL Entry Draft Order
The regulation loss erased most, but not all, of the mystery around the Kraken’s drafting order. If the Philadelphia Flyers earn at least one point in their Thursday game against Buffalo, the Kraken will select 5th in each round of the June NHL Draft. If the Flyers lose in regulation, Seattle will choose 6th.
The Kraken 1st round draft position could still change, based on the results of the Draft Lottery to be held in early May.
1st Period
Early excitement, as L.A. defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov’s hook on Chandler Stephenson is deemed worthy of a penalty shot. Stephenson starts wide left and cuts slowly to the middle, but Kings goalie David Rittich closes the 5-hole with relative ease.
The Kraken dominated offensive play early, outshooting the Kings 11-3. But shot four for L.A. was a picture-perfect deflection by Sam Helenius past goalie Joey Daccord at 15:14.
Shot five found the net, too, at 16:23. On the power play, Adrian Kempe found Alex Turcotte at the back door for a sweet deflection. The Kings have already put more pucks past Daccord than they did in the teams’ last meeting, a 2-1 Seattle victory Apr. 7 at Crypto.com Arena.
2nd Period
Referee Kyle Rehman, a veteran of more than 1,000 NHL games, turned his in-arena microphone on a tad too soon. “You got something to say?” was the pointed question directed at Kraken defenseman Vince Dunn. Apparently, he’d already said something, or kept saying something, because in addition to a slashing penalty, Dunn was assessed an extra two minutes for unsportsmanlike conduct.
Kevin Fiala barely missed growing the Kings lead, banging a shot off the post. Instead, it was the PKers who turned on the offense. Tye Kartye poked the puck free at his own blue line and was off to the shorthanded races. He swept in on Rittich and beat him glove side to narrow the Kraken deficit to 2-1 at 5:26.
ESPN Screengrab
One minute later, Seattle finished killing the double minor. L.A. was called for the next two infractions, and on the second one, Brandon Montour tied the game 2-2. He’d missed seconds earlier on a blast, but when the Kraken obligingly returned the puck to him, Monty put every ounce into a blueline laser (92 mph worth) that beat Rittich cleanly at 13:24, his career-high 18th goal.
In theory, an offensive player isn’t supposed to skate out from behind the goal line to the top of the crease without encountering opposition. Warren Foegele, did, however, parking a backhand for a 3-2 L.A. lead at 16:05.
More Kraken defensive malpractice 1:12 later. As Fiala breaks in 2-on-1, Montour knocks the puck off his stick. Daccord is sprawling to lasso the puck, which deflects off his arm, then his pad. No other Seattle skater comes to his goalie’s rescue as Alex Laferriere restores the visitors’ two goal cushion. Shots at this point are Kraken 22, Kings 12.
Mikey Eyssimont tried a “Michigan,” cupping the puck on his stick behind the net, attempting to cradle it into the top corner of the net. He hit the post instead.
3rd Period
Adrian Kempe’s 35th goal at 1:41 and Sam Helenius’ second of the night at 2:38 – doubling his goal total on the season – removed any remaining competitive charm from the contest.
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Jaden Schwartz at 5:12 gave fans at CPA one last in-game reason to cheer. From the inside edge of the left circle, Schwartz rifled a shot past Rittich.
22 year old, 6-foot-5 Kraken defenseman Ville Ottavainen, playing in his first NHL game, recorded his first NHL point by assisting on the Schwartz goal.
Maybe the Kraken studied the Kings’ backdoor play, because on their next power play, Jordan Eberle executed it to perfection. Eberle sent a cross-crease pass to Matty Beniers, cutting in from the right circle for an easy tap-in to close the gap to 6-4 at 13:34.
With Daccord pulled for an extra attacker, Eeli Tolvanen improbably brought Seattle within 6-5 with 29.8 seconds left.