SEATTLE — A pair of goals yielded late in the second period Saturday night seemed destined to undo the Seattle Kraken right after they’d finally snapped a scoring slump equating to more than two full hockey games.
The sight of Max Domi scoring twice for the Columbus Blue Jackets just minutes after Jared McCann had finally gotten his depleted team on the board would ordinarily prove too daunting for most to overcome. But somehow, the Kraken found it within them to pull back, scoring three third-period goals out of nowhere to salvage a point in what became a 5-4 overtime loss.
Jake Bean notched the winner for Columbus just 55 seconds into the 3-on-3 sudden death frame, moving into the right circle and beating Philipp Grubauer from close range. Bean was traded to Columbus by Carolina shortly after the expansion draft when it had been thought the Kraken might select the defenseman instead of center Morgan Geekie.
Vince Dunn scored the tying marker on a wristshot that beat goalie Elvis Merzlikins from the left circle with 4:04 remaining in regulation to ignite the crowd of 17,151 at Climate Pledge Arena.
Early on in the period, Jaden Schwartz and Geekie had scored twice just 22 seconds apart to breathe new life into a team that seemed dead having headed to the second intermission down 4-1.
The third period outburst by Kraken seemed even more unlikely given they’d struggled for goals all week before learning earlier in the day that top center Yanni Gourde had been placed in COVID-19 protocol.
The absence of centers Gourde and Riley Sheahan, also placed in protocol along with assistant coach Jay Leach, further hampered a Kraken team that hadn’t scored since early in the second period of Monday night’s defeat against Pittsburgh.
And they kept failing to find the net early in this one, despite outshooting the Blue Jackets 7-0 through the opening 10 minutes of the game. After a scoreless opening frame, the Blue Jackets opened the scoring with a Bjorkstrand wristshot goal against Grubauer at 8:13 of the middle frame.
The Kraken’s task grew even more daunting when Jack Roslovic redirected a Domi shot from the top of the left faceoff circle at 11:40 to put the Kraken in a 2-0 hole.
But with their scoring drought having surpassed 130 minutes, the Kraken finally got on the board after some hard work in the corners. Jordan Eberle managed to slip the puck out to McCann, who chipped the puck over Merzlikins and into the net to make it 2-1 with just 6:08 to play until intermission.
But Domi struck for his pair just minutes later,
The biggest of those goals being his second one coming with just 25.4 seconds remaining in the second period. An initial shot by Bjorkstrand from the right circle trickled through Grubauer’s pads and rolled in the crease. Domi was parked right there and easily tapped the puck home to send the teams to intermission with the score 4-1.
