One: Find more overall rhythm \u2013 When your regular NHL lineup is more or less making its preseason debut against mostly AHL prospects things can go off kilter. The early part of Thursday night\u2019s game against the Calgary Flames didn\u2019t have much flow to it overall and that hurt from a Kraken perspective as the core group rounds into game shape.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought our team got better as the game went on,\u201d\u00a0Kraken coach Lane Lambert said. \u201cThere was some noticeable rust or cobwebs or whatever.\u201d<\/p>\n
The\u00a0Kraken regulars were already going to be rusty as they hadn\u2019t played yet in preseason. But then throw in a bunch of young opposing players all running around trying to leave an impression before they get sent down to the AHL and the all-around cohesion of play left plenty to be desired.<\/p>\n
All of the second period fighting didn\u2019t help either with lengthy delays between each round of fisticuffs while officials tried to figure out who started and finished it. Lambert was pleased to see his team owning much of the third period and then the overtime before winning in a shootout. He also felt going to OT was a positive in that it helped his team get exposure to 3-on-3 play among other differing scenarios throughout the night.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to prepare to go (Saturday) and to find that rhythm,\u201d Lambert said.<\/p>\n
Two: Shaking up the lines? \u2013 Lambert said Friday he came away impressed by the speed and the improving play of a line featuring former college teammates Matty Beniers, Mackie Samoskevic and Jared McCann.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought there was certainly some speed to that line,\u201d Lambert said. \u201cI liked Mackie\u2019s game as he went along. I thought early on that Matty tried to do too much, but I thought he settled in very similar to the rest of our team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lambert also felt\u00a0McCann had \u201csome good opportunities as well\u201d and would like to see more.<\/p>\n
He\u2019d like to maintain lineup continuity in Vancouver, saying the team has \u201cgot to get some rhythm and some flow\u201d but he wouldn\u2019t rule out similar forward lines with \u201ca tweak here or there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He did say that the trio of Berkly Catton, Shane Wright and Kaapo Kakko looked \u201cdisconnected on the forecheck and will need to get more connected this final preseason game and in practice next week.<\/p>\n
Three: They gave as good as they got \u2013 Much of the buzz Friday was still about all the skirmishes that erupted in the second period of Thursday\u2019s game. Lambert was asked what he felt about his team\u2019s \u201cresponse\u201d to a pair of hits on Samoskevich and Chandler Stephenson, then Ville Ottavainen after that.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you have to have a response then I like the word \u2018response\u2019,\u201d Lambert said. \u201cI like the word \u2018initiate\u2019 better. But certainly, if you\u2019re talking about the physicality and that stuff, I thought we stuck together well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lambert added that he felt \u201cthe intensity level of the game\u201d ratcheting up in that middle period was likely a turning point.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t necessarily see that in an exhibition game,\u201d he said. \u201cIn the days of the old seven, eight or nine exhibition games you don\u2019t quite see that so much. So, I thought it was a good thing for our hockey team in that scenario, in that situation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One: Find more overall rhythm \u2013 When your regular NHL lineup is more or less making its preseason…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":910074,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":["post-910073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=910073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/910074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=910073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=910073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=910073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}