Kraken can’t capitalize on roaring home crowd, lose 6-4 to Avs to fall behind in series

Minutes before his Kraken came onto the ice for their first-ever home game in the Stanley Cup playoffs, Tod Leiweke, the team CEO/visionary who made this franchise happen, climbed onto the bench

“Seattle, we did it! You did it!” Leiweke yelled into a microphone and through the arena’s public-address system.

“This building is electric, because of our great fans! But we are going to ask you tonight to take it up a notch....

“Tonight, we are going to blow the roof off this joint.”

The Kraken came back home Saturday night for Game 3 of their first-round series with the defending Cup champion Colorado Avalanche. And, true to their CEO’s prediction, Climate Pledge Arena was absolutely off the hook.

The Kraken themselves? Not as much.

Seattle lost an early 1-0 lead that became a 3-1 hole. It lost a 3-3 tie by allowing Colorado consecutive goals 68 seconds apart early in the third period. And the Kraken continued to malfunction when they should have thrived, after Colorado penalties, in a turnover-filled, 6-4 loss.

It puts Seattle behind in this series for the first time, two games to one.

“We just have to be better,” Seattle’s Jaden Schwartz said after his two goals Saturday were not enough.

Game 4 of the best-of-seven first-round set in the NHL’s Western Conference playoffs is Monday 7 p.m. at Climate Pledge Arena.

Game 5 is Wednesday in Denver. The Kraken need to win at least one of the next two for there to be a Game 6 back in Seattle. That would be Friday.

“Those guys are world-class players,” Kraken coach Dave Hakstol said of the defending Cup champions.

“We gave them too much space tonight. (We need to make it) a little more difficult.”

For much of Saturday inside the glittering rebuild under the historic, pointed roof at Seattle Center, it sounded like the original version of this building. It was like the Seattle Center Coliseum used to be when Shawn Kemp was dunking off passes from Gary Payton in the early 1990s, or when those Sonics hosted Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls in the 1996 NBA Finals in remodeled KeyArena.

“Yeah, it was pretty special,” Schwartz said of the Climate Pledge Arena crowd Saturday, inside a Kraken locker that was as quiet postgame as the arena was loud during it.

“We were all looking forward to tonight, just like the whole city was. It was exciting...

“It was obviously pretty cool going out, seeing those fans and having a first playoff game.”

Hakstol said he “loved the atmosphere. Loved the building.

“That’s a playoff feel, that’s what it is.”

Like the Kraken namesake, those roaring fans were sunk into the deep by midway through the second period. That’s when Colorado had come back from trailing 1-0 early to gain a 3-1 lead.

Then the Kraken — and the noise — resurfaced.

Defenseman Jamie Oleksiak surprised Colorado’s defense with a move with the puck around two men into the slot. His shot also surprised Avalanche goaltender Alexandar Georgiev: a back-hander into the upper-right corner of the net for a goal. The Kraken were within 3-2.

The reawakened crowd was still celebrating that when Seattle’s Matty Beniers jammed home a loose puck past Georgiev. In 19 seconds, the Kraken had gone from down 3-1 to a 3-3 tie.

It was the third-fastest pair of goals this NHL postseason.

It was, for Seattle hockey, Nirvana.

Truly.

Seattle’s 1990s Nirvana grunge anthem, “Lithium,” was blaring again over the arena PA. Chants of “LET’S GO KRAKEN!” rained down onto the ice, ringing ears. Again.

The palace at Seattle Center, and the press bridge catwalk at the top of the arena, were bouncing from the noise.

“I mean, they were fantastic. I’m sure you guys heard it — especially in the second period there,” Oleksiak said. “End of the second, we had a lot of momentum...

“We’ve just got to feed off of that for the full 60 (minutes).”

But then, just as quickly as Colorado had turned a 1-0 deficit into a 3-1 lead in the second period, the Avalanche turned 3-3 into a 5-3 lead early in the third.

Mikko Rentenan scored 3 minutes into the final period to make it 4-3 Colorado. Just over a minute later, star scorer Nathan MacKinnon scored his second goal of the game, unassisted past Seattle goaltender Philipp Grubauer (33 shots, 28 saves).

And the Kraken were down two goals again.

“He was the difference maker that we’ve come to expect, in big games, in must-win games,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said of MacKinnon, who scored 42 goals with 69 assists in the regular season.

Seattle got another power-play chance with 12 minutes left, normally a positive while behind. But the Kraken were 0 for 8 with a man advantage in the series at that point. That included 0 for 3 Saturday, with a short-handed goal allowed in Colorado’s early-game comeback.

Hakstol said Friday his team needed to be simpler on the power play, shoot more, pass less outside. Yet a man up needing to get back in the game in the third period Saturday, Seattle got only one shot during the power play. That was a wrist shot by Jared McCann with 49 seconds left in the 2:00 advantage. Colorado goaltender Alexandar Georgiev flicked that aside with his blocking pad on his right forearm.

The power play ended with Seattle 0 for 9 in the series, and still down 5-3.

Rantenan added an empty-net goal with Grubauer pulled for an extra Seattle attacker. That was with 2:13 remaining, to make it 6-3.

Seattle got a consolation-prize goal, on a power play, the second of the night by Schwartz off a face off with 39.5 seconds left, to make the final score 6-4.

Power-less power play

That was the theme of the night.

Seattle’s biggest problem in Game 3 should have been its largest advantage: When Colorado was down a man by penalty.

Late in the first period with the Kraken up 1-0, Grubauer came out to save an undefended wrist shot from the left side of the slot, point-blank range, by Colorado’s Logan O’Connor. O’Connor sent the rebound behind Grubauer but across the crossbar and crease and staying out of the goal.

The Kraken then got its second power play of the opening period — as many as they had in all of Game 2 Thursday. But instead of taking advantage, Seattle gave away its lead. Forward Daniel Sprong fell down, creating a breakaway chance Colorado’s J.T. Comper converted past the helpless Grubauer. That’s how the game got tied with 4 minutes left in the first period.

The tie didn’t last long.

The teams traded penalties inside the final 2 minutes of the period. Playing four on four with more-open ice, Seattle’s two point men along the blue line dived deep into the attack zone. That allowed Colorado’s Rantanen to make a stretch pass out of his own end while falling down to outside the Seattle blue line. With no Seattle dark-blue jersey in sight, MacKinnon skated as if turbocharged, past every Kraken into a breathtaking breakaway.

The 111-point man during this regular season snapped the puck past Grubauer to put the Avalanche ahead for the first time Saturday, 2-1.

It was the first time the roars paused all night.

“They were fantastic,” Beniers said of the Kraken’s roaring 17,000-plus. “They were awesome all night.”

After the game, MacKinnon said the Kraken have been the toughest first-round opponent Colorado’s faced in his recent years of excellence.

Hakstol said Saturday night the Kraken need to handle Colorado’s initial pressure to get the puck into the attacking zone on the power play. And, yes, they still need to get the puck inside more into better shooting positions against Georgiev.

The first period that began so splendidly for Seattle — seven of the game’s first eight shots on goal, the only score, the roaring home crowd — ended with the Kraken behind after one for the first time in the series.

Saturday’s second period began like Thursday’s did for Seattle in Denver: Worse.

The Kraken continually turned over the puck in the neutral zone and failed to sustain possession in Colorado’s end — or anywhere. The Avalanche pounced.

Grubauer did his part to keep it a one-goal game. But then Colorado’s Alex Newhook won a faceoff — the Avalanche won them all night in Seattle’s end — and passed the puck back to Cale Makar. The defenseman’s 92-mph slap shot from the top of the right face-off circle beat Grubauer past his gloved, left hand for a 3-1 Colorado lead.

The Kraken had their largest deficit of the series.

But not for long.

Kraken’s latest fast start

Propelled by the rave-like energy in the building and the incessant roars of the crowd, the Kraken came out flying.

Alex Wennberg kept the puck in Seattle’s attacking zone along the boards, and again with pounding forechecking behind the net. That created Justin Schultz’s pass to Schwartz for the first goal of Game 3.

Schwartz’s first of the postseason made this the third consecutive game the Kraken scored first on Colorado.

But as in Game 2, Seattle’s lead vanished.

“We didn’t complete that first period,” Hakstol said.

“It has a really different look if we complete that first period the right way.”