Kraken Show Resilience, Offensive Firepower In First Win Over Rangers At Madison Square Garden

The Seattle Kraken were down 3-1 against the New York Rangers Sunday, but Seattle stormed back with five unanswered goals to pull off their first-ever win over the Blueshirts at Madison Square Garden. And the Kraken's resilience was on full display in the win.

The Seattle Kraken played an imperfect game Sunday at Madison Square Garden, but thanks to a determined last line of defense, the Kraken earned their first-ever win at MSG in a roller-coaster, 7-5 defeat of the New York Rangers.

The Blueshirts were 6-0-1 all-time against Seattle heading into Sunday’s game, and for the first 24:47 of action, the Rangers looked like they were going to walk all over the Kraken, building a 3-1 lead as they came at Seattle in waves. But from that point on – and thanks in no small part to veteran goalie Philipp Grubauer – the floodgates opened in Seattle’s offensive zone, and the Kraken scored five straight goals to take a commanding 6-3 lead with 8:47 left in regulation time.

The Rangers desperately tried to get back into the game, outshooting Seattle 37-22 in the matchup. And the Rangers did come close to tying it, scoring twice in the third to make the score 6-5 in favor of the Kraken. And with Blueshirts goalie Jonathan Quick pulled for the extra attacker, Seattle got an empty-net marker from Yanni Gourde with 1:46 left to put the game out of reach at 7-5. But Grubauer did enough to keep his team in it, and he won his second game of the season.

The Rangers might have done better had superstar goalie Igor Shesterkin been between the pipes, but he was unavailable as his wife went into labor Sunday morning. But given the way the Rangers were passive in their own zone and unable to stop the Kraken from making their goal-scoring chances count, it wouldn’t have mattered who was in net for the Blueshirts.

This game marked the biggest amount of goals the Rangers have given up this season, and they were rightfully booed off the ice at the end of Sunday’s tilt. But give Seattle credit – they didn’t give up when they were down two goals, and their four-game road trip record improved to 3-1-0 with the win over the Blueshirts.

With four games in five nights -- including a 4-2 win over Carolina to kick off the road swing -- it would’ve been easy for the Kraken to pack it in and accept defeat Sunday. But they’ve improved to 14-14-1 this season as the sixth-place team in the Pacific Division, putting some space (four standings points) between themselves and the seventh-place San Jose Sharks. And they’re now only two points behind fifth-place Calgary, and they’re only three points behind fourth-place Edmonton.

The Oilers and Flames both have two games in hand on Seattle, but the resilience the Kraken showed Sunday has to be encouraging for Seattle fans. The Kraken still have an uphill battle to get into a solid spot in the Pacific, but they came back from a significant deficit and handed a sub-par Rangers team the loss they deserved.

The Kraken now head home for a four-game homestand against Florida, Boston, Tampa Bay and Ottawa. They’ll want to clean up their play in their own zone, but this win over the Rangers should give Seattle some confidence that they can take a few shots and still have what it takes to win games. 

Beating the Blueshirts wasn’t easy, but the Kraken will take every win they can get as they focus on improving from a .500 team and showing the rest of the Pacific that they’re going to be a challenging, forceful team the rest of the way this season. They could've folded when they were down a pair of goals against the Rangers, but instead, they came together as a team and pulled out a much-needed victory.