Matty Beniers scored twice in a dominant first period, and Philipp Grubauer turned aside 24 shots as the Seattle Kraken rolled past the Nashville Predators 4-1 on Thursday night.
Seattle struck three times in the opening frame, continuing a strong rebound that has seen the Kraken win five of their last six games after enduring a stretch in which they dropped 10 of 11.
Beniers opened the scoring at 3:48 of the first with a long shot from near the blue line. Jamie Oleksiak doubled the lead midway through the period, and Beniers struck again just 10 seconds later to make it 3-0.
Oleksiak briefly exited in the third period after blocking a puck with the back of his knee, but later returned.
Roman Josi spoiled Grubauer’s shutout with a power-play goal late in the second period, assisted by Luke Evangelista and Ryan O’Reilly. Any hope of a comeback ended when Jared McCann sealed the win with a long-range empty-net goal with 2:13 remaining.
Juuse Saros finished with 19 saves for Nashville. Seattle received assists from Jordan Eberle, Ryan Winterton, Ryker Evans, Jacob Melanson, Kaapo Kakko, and Ryan Lindgren.
Up Next
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Predators: Visit Calgary on Saturday.
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Kraken: Travel to Vancouver on Friday night.
