By Silvia-Leija Rosas, edited by Charles Hamaker

Dallas, TX - Our Seattle Kraken fell to the Dallas Stars, in another game where they lacked an offensive punch, in a 0-2 shutout on Sunday, October 13th, 2024. You could definitely tell this was the second contest of a back-to-back for Seattle who had a slow start and couldn’t rally enough in the third to notch a point. It’s a tough result to see, but considering how early on it is in the 2024-25 season and seeing as it came against one of the best teams in the NHL’s Western Conference, it shouldn’t be any cause for major concern at this point.

The goals for Dallas came just 13 seconds apart, with the first from Sam Steel and second from Wyatt Johnston. The Kraken’s 25 shots against Casey DeSmith in his debut with Dallas weren’t enough to get past the Stars’ defense and the Kraken got on the plane to Nashville scoreless, looking to avoid another such fate when they close out their first road trip of the season by battling the Predators.

Philipp Grubauer kept the Kraken above water

It may be a weird thing to say when Seattle got shut out, I know, but Dallas only scored two goals! Philipp Grubauer ended the night with a .917 save percentage after stopping 22 of 24 shots, a miracle considering how the Kraken defense seemed to crumble around “The German Gentleman.” It’s especially wild to consider, as Seattle was outshot in the first period by a margin of 13-6. During the last two frames, Grubauer made big save after big save against a Dallas team energized by their lead. It’s been well documented Seattle fans have mixed feelings about Grubauer but all I can say is at least the Dallas score wasn’t higher. Had the Kraken been able to get on the board at all in this contest, Grubauer would’ve deserved more shine for his performance considering he had two major saves in the third period that prevented this from at minimum being a four goal lead for the Stars. Over the course of the two seasons before this and through just a handful of games to begin this season it’s obvious to anyone that has more than a basic understanding of hockey that goaltending is not a major problem for Seattle, and that was on display once again in this loss. The Kraken defensive issues have a lot to do with scoring against, and that’s the next takeaway…

Defensive struggles persist

Dallas capitalized on defensive lapses, particularly in transition, which led to key scoring opportunities. With Vince Dunn out due to an upper-body injury, Josh Mahura debuted in Kraken colors next to Will Borgen on the teams third pairing. The pair’s confusion in front of Grubauer’s net led to the first goal when both defenseman ended up on the right side of the net, leaving an easy lane for Sam Steel to tip the puck in behind Grubauer. Again, only two goals, but these small defensive mistakes are what have kept the Kraken from finding their stride to start the season. It seems like they lose all confidence in their playmaking availability and get stuck in their own zone instead of being able to clear the puck. We saw it in the first game when they gave up a two goal lead against the St. Louis Blues and even in the shootout win against Minnesota, as they went back and forth against the Wild despite showing some positive signs with the puck. Defensive miscues and mental lapses have been a big problem for the Kraken over the last few seasons, whether it was during the teams 2022-23 season when they reached the postseason and pushed this Stars franchise to a game seven, or last years disappointing season where too many mistakes and failures saw Seattle fall short of the postseason. While the Kraken have largely played solid defensively over the past two years, frustration lies in the fact that they could be even better if not for some of these mistakes and mental mistakes.

Some sleep could help

Like I said in the game preview, the Kraken arrived in Dallas with sleep still in their eyes. While the Stars also played the night before, their game wasn’t nearly as taxing as the Kraken’s shootout winner. The Kraken have a day between their matchup against the Nashville Predators to rest and maybe hit the snooze button a few times, with no practice scheduled and we’ll have to imagine that it’s an off day considering that it would be rough to have the team practice the same day they flew into Nashville and coming off a back-to-back that featured two of the hardest teams to play in the NHL. It needs to be stated, even with the frustration in being shutout and in the defensive mistakes that Seattle made in this game, that this was always going to be a tough contest for the Kraken to play in because of the fact that it was a back-to-back with some decent distance traveled and especially so when you consider the teams that they were playing during it.

Check out Circling Seattle Sports’ previous Seattle Kraken articles here.

Check out Circling Seattle Sports’ previous articles written by Silvia Leija Rosas here, and follow her on Twitter here.

Check out Circling Seattle Sports’ previous articles with photos by Liz Wolter here, and her portfolio here.

Support the work of Circling Seattle Sports by checking out our merchandise!