*Photo from Seattle Sports-My Northwest*
Seattle leads series 1-0
Defending champions, meet the Kraken. Eeli Tolvanen scored, Alex Wennberg had a goal and an assist, and the Seattle Kraken defeated the Colorado Avalanche with a 3-1 victory on Tuesday night in Denver.
In their first ever playoff game, the Kraken came out and beat the defending champion Avalanche after they secured the first wild card spot in the western conference. Wennberg was the only multi point scorer, with 5 other skaters recording a point.
Wennberg said of the win that "It's great. We played a good game, getting the first franchise win in playoffs, but right now this is Game 1. Obviously, we are happy about this performance, but we've got to do it again and do it again, so it's a good start and feeling for sure."
Starting the scoring for the Kraken was Tolvanen, who scored the franchise's first playoff goal 3:26 into the game, making it 1-0 with an unassisted goal. At the 12:35 mark of the first, the Avalanche evened things up. It was Mikko Rantanen who did so, tying the game 1-1 with assists from Bo Byram and Nathan MacKinnon.
The second period started with early fireworks. Wennberg scored the only goal of the period, coming 1:20 into the second, assisted by Jaden Schwartz and Jamie Oleksiak to make it 2-1 Kraken. The only goal of the 3rd period came from Morgan Geekie, making it a 3-1 Kraken score with assists going to Wennberg and Justin Schultz.
Getting the start to open the playoffs for the Kraken was Philipp Grubauer, who signed with Seattle prior to 2021-2022 after playing for the Avalanche. Grubauer picked up the win against his old team, making 34 saves on 35 shots, giving him a .971 save percentage.
Asked about playing the Avalanche in the playoffs, Grubauer said that "It's definitely a weird feeling coming back but also like really familiar. I played with those guys in a couple of playoff series, so yeah, there's nothing better than playing against your old team in playoffs."
It was Alexandar Georgiev in net to open the series for the Avalanche, just as expected. Georgiev got tagged with the loss, turning aside 27 out of the 30 shots on goal from the Kraken, recording an even .900 save percentage.
Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar said of the loss that "I didn't like our execution. That was probably the first thing that stood out to me. Just sloppy from our group a little bit. I like some of the intensity that we played with at times, but I would say they won more than their fair share of races to pucks and probably won more than their fair share of battles for pucks too."
Game two of the series on Thursday night, remaining in Denver. The Kraken will look to go ahead 2-0 in the series with another win, while the Avalanche vie for a win to tie the series at a game apiece.
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