Teddy Blueger scored his first goal of the season on a short-handed breakaway early in the first period, Sam Lafferty and Nils Hoglander scored three minutes apart in the third period, and the visiting Vancouver Canucks beat the Seattle Kraken 5-1 on Friday night.
Dakota Joshua scored on a rebound in the second period and Quinn Hughes picked up another assist to remain the top point scorer in the league as the Canucks evened the season series with their Pacific Northwest rivals.
Thatcher Demko made 23 saves and was excellent in the second period when Seattle controlled play but couldn’t get a shot past the Vancouver goalie.
"As the game went on we got better. It was a good win for us."
Dakota Joshua with @CanucksReporter after the big 5-1 win over Seattle! pic.twitter.com/Lmh5YReCba
— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) November 25, 2023
Blueger gave Vancouver the early lead, taking advantage of a turnover by Seattle defenceman Justin Schultz at centre ice while on the power play and beat Kraken goaltender Joey Daccord. Joshua doubled the lead at 12:07 of the second period finding himself in the right spot to tap the puck past Daccord after Conor Garland’s initial shot was saved.
Lafferty gave the Canucks a 3-1 lead at 9:43 of the third redirecting Filip Hronek’s slap shot past Daccord. Hughes picked up a secondary assist on the goal, extending his points streak to 10 straight games, the longest active streak in the league.
Hoglander scored at 12:38 and Ilya Mikheyev provided the capper at 17:30 just after a power play ended.
With a significant contingent of Canucks fans in attendance, Vancouver won for just the second time in the past five games. The Canucks went 11 of 12 games with at least a point, but losses to Calgary, Seattle and Colorado had stemmed some of Vancouver’s early momentum.
The Canucks also improved to 4-1-0 in Seattle since the Kraken joined the league.
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Seattle stumbled at its first chance to climb above the .500 mark after a sluggish start to the season. The Kraken had picked up points in five straight games.
Tye Kartye scored Seattle’s goal at 17:29 of the second period, his first goal in 15 games. Daccord made 22 saves.
Seattle lost forward Brandon Tanev to an apparent left leg injury late in the first period when he took a hit at centre ice from Hoglander and tumbled to the ice. Tanev suffered an injury to the same leg in the season opener against Vegas on an illegal hit to the head by Brett Howden that resulted in a suspension. Tanev missed about a month and returned on Nov. 13.
UP NEXT
Canucks: at San Jose on Saturday.
Kraken: at Chicago next Tuesday.
AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl
Tim Booth, The Associated Press
