For the first time since Nov. 24, the Utah Hockey Club has lost a road game.
It was a seven-game winning streak in other teams’ buildings, but the Seattle Kraken put an end to that on Monday night, beating Utah HC 5-2. Utah has now dropped four consecutive games. They have to adjust quickly if they’re going to have any chance at making the playoffs in their inaugural season.
Utah opened the scoring with a power play goal from Logan Cooley. Jaden Schwartz tied it up for Seattle with a power play goal of his own, only to have it revoked by a coach’s challenge. But in a span of 51 seconds late in the first period, the Kraken would score twice to take a 2-1 lead.
Alexander Kerfoot scored the lone goal of the second period, to knot the score at two goals apiece, but the third period was all Kraken. Schwartz, who had assisted on both of his team’s previous goals, scored first, followed by Matty Beniers and an empty-netter from Jared McCann.
But there was a lot more nuance to the game than that. Here’s the full story.
Utah hockey for dummies
The concept of a coach’s challenge is probably newer to seasoned hockey fans than it is to fans of other sports who are now discovering hockey for the first time. The NHL instituted the rule in 2015, allowing teams to challenge goals for offside, goaltender interference and missed stoppages of play. If the call on the ice is upheld, the challenging team is assessed a minor penalty for delay of game.
Utah HC took advantage of that ability late in the second period after Schwartz scored on the power play.
When the video coaches recognized that the Kraken had entered the zone offside, they communicated it to assistant coach John Madden, whom you may have seen wearing an earpiece on the bench. It’s then up to Madden and the other coaches to notify the officials that they’d like to make a challenge.
It was Utah’s third challenge of the season. The first was unsuccessful but the following two have been in their favor. They’ve also lost six goals due to challenges from opposing coaches.
Utah hockey for casual fans
It’s been easy to criticize Utah’s third line this season. Lawson Crouse, Nick Bjugstad and Matias Maccelli each scored more than 40 points last year, but nearing the halfway point this season they have just 25 points combined. When you’re in a scoring slump, you have to find other ways to contribute to the team — and that’s exactly what they did on Monday night.
All game long, the trio did two things: They put pucks on net and they played physical hockey. No, they didn’t score, but they provided the energy that’s expected from a third line in the NHL.
Per Money Puck, Crouse, Bjugstad and Maccelli were among Utah’s top four players in terms of expected goals percentage. That’s a much-needed change from their norm this season, as they’re the only line with a net negative expected goal differential.
“I think they had good pace,” said head coach André Tourigny after the game. “They put pucks at the net, they had opportunities on rebounds. (It’s just that) right now, the puck doesn’t roll for them.”
Utah hockey for nerds
For the first time ever, I’m going to use a question from X in my game cover article. Thanks to Jordan Boyce for asking it.
As Jordan pointed out, it seemed like every time the Kraken touched the puck, they had another odd-man rush. Three of their goals came from breakaways and they easily could have scored a few more with the amount of times they had numbers going into the offensive zone. Why did they give up so much?
Tourigny gave the answer in his post-game press conference.
“We forced the play too much,” he said. “We’re feeling the pressure right now of scoring goals instead (of) just playing the game in front of us and (finding) space.”
What does that mean? It means the guys were so focused on scoring that they neglected the defensive side of the game. The defensemen were constantly pinching and playing high in the neutral zone, which allowed the Kraken easy stretch passes. They struggled to score in their previous two games so it’s likely that they were just overly eager this time.
That’s evident in the play of guys like Olli Määttä and Juuso Välimäki — and they do it every game, not just in this one. They like to be involved in the offense so much that they often find themselves in the slot, looking for deflections and rebounds. It’s cool when it pays off every now and then, but if you cause more goals against than you score, you lose the game.
Again, the odd-man rushes are not solely on the shoulders of Määttä and Välimäki. The forwards backchecked less than they normally do. The other defensemen got caught cheating in the neutral zone. Defense is the entire team’s responsibility and everyone sacrificed it on Monday in an effort to score more goals.
“You cannot win if you give the number of opportunities we gave tonight, in terms of breakaways or two-on-ones,” Tourigny said. “Sometimes it will happen. There will be a broken play, there will be a play (that) you cannot prevent: a blocked shot or a puck jumps over your stick. That stuff happens. But we need to just get a little bit more mature and more patient in our game.”
What’s next?
The team plane better be full of winter jackets and toques because its next stop is a chilly one: Edmonton, Alberta.
Edmonton native Dylan Guenther has scored at Rogers Place, the Oilers’ arena, more than any other player on the roster — but he’s never tallied a point there as an NHL player. See, the Edmonton Oil Kings, with whom Guenther played the majority of his junior hockey, play out of the same arena as the Oilers.
The Oilers have a three-point hold on the third playoff spot in the Pacific Division. They lost in game seven of the Stanley Cup Final last year, so anything less than winning the Cup this year would be considered failure.
Utah fans can watch the game on Utah HC+ and Utah 16. The puck drops at 7 p.m. MDT.
Correction: The original version of this article stated the Utah Hockey Club had lost three games in a row. The loss to the Kraken Monday night was UHC’s fourth loss in a row.