Montour, Stephenson carry Seattle Kraken to 3-0 win over Predators

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SEATTLE, WASHINGTON - NOVEMBER 20: Brandon Montour #62 of the Seattle Kraken shoots the puck during the third period of a game against the Nashville Predators at Climate Pledge Arena on November 20, 2024 in Seattle, Washington. (Christopher Mast / NHLI / Getty Images)

SEATTLE - Brandon Montour had a goal and an assist, Chandler Stephenson had a trio of helpers, and Daniel Sprong scored his first goal back with the Kraken as Seattle shutout the struggling Nashville Predators 3-0 on Wednesday night.

Joey Daccord notched his first shutout of the year with 24 saves, and Yanni Gourde scored on an empty net as Seattle finished its six-game home stand with five victories. All five wins came with Daccord in net for Seattle.

It was a banner night for Seattle's two big offseason additions to the roster in Montour and Stephenson.

"Monty's pretty much, in every way he steps on the ice, he's a dynamic player and a force to be reckoned with with his skating, with defending, with his offense, with his getting into the rush," head coach Dan Bylsma said. You double take when the first player up the ice is 62 banging the puck in the net. But, you know, that's awesome to see."

Predators goaltender Juuse Saros did a terrific job keeping the Kraken off the board for the first 35 minutes of the contest. A standout denial of Stephenson in the closing seconds of the first period was the highlight of the night for Nashville.

However, Stephenson would factor in heavily on the goal that finally did give Seattle the lead. Montour backhanded the puck back into the offensive zone from just inside the blue line, and it fell perfectly to Stephenson at the front of the net. Stephenson quickly got Saros moving to his left before laying a pass off for Sprong, who snapped home the goal for a 1-0 lead.

"When Monty threw it through to the net, I was more going for the rebound first, and then Steves went to his backhand," Sprong said. "It was like a split second where I'm like, 'I think it might come back to me.' So I was just ready in case it did. And, you know, it's a great play. And he gave me a wide open net, and I'll bury those."

Sprong hadn't scored since the opening night of the season with the Vancouver Canucks. He rejoined the Kraken late last week after being re-acquired in a trade from Vancouver earlier this month, though it took a few days to get cleared through immigration to play.

"You know, I've scored in this building a good amount of goals, and I've had a lot of success here," Sprong said. "So it was nice to have a good practice yesterday, get get back into that speed and, you know, have a full game routine with a morning skate and everything, and feel myself again."

Early in the third period, Stephenson and Montour connected again to double the advantage. Stephenson drew all three Nashville defenders as he crossed the Predators blue line. Another great pass from Stephenson from the left wall found Montour driving to the net as he directed the puck by Saros for a 2-0 lead.

"I think Chandler made two - we talked about his intelligence, talked about his smarts, and you know, I was probably screaming from the bench on the first one to shoot the puck on the first one, but what a great play to Spronger, to get Spronger his first for us, and the game-winning goal as a result," Bylsma said. "But two outstanding plays by Chandler. The first goal, obviously, but the second goal was an outstanding play. I think he's got one goal, but that's probably, you know, double digits in assists right now. He's a super intelligent player. And those are two excellent, awesome plays from Chandler tonight."

Stephenson said Montour yelled at him for the puck as they rushed into the Nashville zone.

"He turned on the burners, and just kind of had to lay it in there for him and yeah. So it worked out," Stephenson said.

"Not too many guys I've played with, I've had a rush chance (and) it's a D-man. It's usually your wingers, but he just got into to a good spot."

The Predators appeared to cut the deficit in half with just over nine minutes left to play. A pass from Alexandre Carrier deflected off the skates of Tommy Novak and through several bodies in the goal crease to find the net. However, a review of the goal determined Novak kicked the puck into the net with his skate, which took the goal off the board.

The official determination was a "distinct kicking motion" by Novak, though it seemed like a 50-50 call on whether it was truly a kick or Novak's stopping motion.

Zachary L'Heureux had a breakaway look just before the Novak non-goal that was cleanly stopped by Daccord as the Nashville rookie bent his stick heavily over his head in frustration. Per MoneyPuck.com, Daccord's performance resulted in 2.98 goals saved over expected. Per NaturalStatTrick.com, it was even better at 3.73 goals saved over expected.

While Philipp Grubuaer certainly wasn't poor in Seattle's loss to the New York Rangers on the back end of a back-to-back on Sunday, Daccord has just been purely exceptional this season for the Kraken.

"Joey's had the net for four of those games, the first four games, and played extremely well," Bylsma said. "I was disappointed he didn't get the shutout in the Islander game just because of how well he's been playing. And tonight, it was gratifying to see him get the shut out just to accent how well he's been playing."

Gourde's empty net goal with 2:43 left to play was the icing on one of Seattle's best performances of the season.

"Especially after that road trip, I don't think we were happy with that. So this is great," Montour said. "You know, obviously, last game could have had a better results. But again, you couldn't ask for more energy this week or the last two weeks. And guys are excited to see what direction we're going right now."

Coaching staff kudos:

The Kraken coaching staff was responsible for earning the team an early power play chance due to a mistake from the Nashville coaching staff with their starting lineup.

Dan Bylsma and the coaching staff caught the Predators starting the wrong lineup for the game in a procedural mishap from the Predators. Steven Stamkos had mistakenly been listed in the starting lineup in place of Filip Forsberg, who started the game alongside his usual line mates in Gustav Nyquist and Ryan O'Reilly.

"That's not the way they played the last games. It's not the way they warmed up," Bylsma said. "So when it was submitted, it was noted, and we were double-checking during the anthem, and it gave us an opportunity."

Bylsma said the responsibility lies with the opposing coaching staff to be aware of a mistake with the lineup like that. When the Predators started the game with Forsberg, O'Reilly and Nyquist, Bylsma notified the lineman of the error. The lineman and referee then conferred during the first stoppage and confirmed the mistake as Seattle got their power play chance.

"The puck needs to drop for it to happen, so we were waiting for the puck to drop to alert the referees and the linesmen that that was the case," Bylsma said. "And so at that time, our bench knew that they had started the wrong lineup. And we got the whistle and alerted the referees and got the power play."