A Stitch Off The Odd Block

Kraken defender Ryan Lindgren knows all about blocking shots with his face and swears fellow blue-liner Jamie Oleksiak contemplated the same during last week’s victory over the Winnipeg Jets.

A puck struck the crossbar and was cleared from the Kraken crease with two seconds to go in a scoreless first period, but Jets forward Mark Scheifele quickly swooped in and snapped off a buzzer-beating shot attempt from the left faceoff circle. Oleksiak was tangled among a pile of bodies at the goalmouth and appeared to stick his head in the path of the oncoming puck, only to see it first land in goalie Joey Daccord’s glove.

“Joey ended up gloving it, but if he doesn’t, I think that thing is hitting him right in the face,” Lindgren said with a touch of admiration. “Guys do whatever they can to keep the puck out of the net.”

The Kraken certainly have, sitting sixth best in the league as of Wednesday in blocked shots per 60 minutes at 17.5 -- up from 16.1 a season ago. They have also excelled at limiting the quality of shots they allow through, leading the entire NHL with an expected save percentage of .944 on unblocked shots during even-strength play.

That’s one reason the Kraken are allowing an 11th-best 2.8 goals per game compared to a 24th-place ranking of 3.2 a season ago.

Lindgren and Oleksiak are tied for second most blocked shots on the team at 18 apiece behind Kraken leader Adam Larsson’s 22. But with the Kraken, shot blocking is truly a team-wide event as Josh Mahura has 17 and Brandon Montour has 14 despite appearing in only six of the team’s 10 games. Chandler Stephenson and Eeli Tolvanen have 10 blocks apiece, Jaden Schwartz has nine, Matty Beniers has eight, and Vince Dunn has seven after his two key blocks in the final 30 seconds last Saturday to preserve a Kraken victory over Edmonton.

“I think it’s about being able to read the play and making sure you get in a lane,” said Lindgren, a longtime New York Rangers veteran who signed as a free agent with the Kraken over the summer. “Guys are so good at being able to change the angle of a shot and bring it close to the body and make it difficult for you to get in front of it.”

Lindgren has his share of horror stories about getting in front of pucks any way he can, including with his face. Playing for the Rangers in April 2023, he attempted an overtime block against Buffalo and took a Jeff Skinner slap shot off the jaw. He went in for treatment but was back on the bench minutes later for the shootout round.

“It didn’t get me square in the face, but it got me pretty good in the face,” Lindgren said. “That’ll hurt. I got a couple of stitches or whatever, but I finished the game.”

His new teammate at the time, veteran forward Patrick Kane, assumed Lindgren had broken his jaw and thought it was “crazy” that he came back. Lindgren was also hit in the face by a puck during a 2022 playoff game against Carolina, but didn’t miss a shift. Two weekends ago, playing with the Kraken in Toronto, he took a puck off his head late in regulation.

He was woozy and helped off the ice, but didn’t miss the rest of the road trip. The Kraken called up AHL defenseman Ville Ottavainen just in case, but didn’t use him.

Oleksiak said he doesn’t voluntarily stick his head in front of pucks. But taking one or two in painful spots is merely a byproduct of being committed to shot blocking.

“A big part of it is just willingness,” he said.

The worst pain he’s felt from blocks happened “a couple of times” when a puck struck under his pads and right on his knee. “When that happens, you have to get off and take a minute and get some blood flowing back in the knee,” Oleksiak said.

But he still finished those games.

Given those risks, Oleksiak noted that teammates are often quite appreciative of the extra effort. The entire Kraken bench erupted when 19-year-old Kraken forward Berkly Catton, who now has four shot blocks in just five career games, got his first one in his NHL debut in Philadelphia last week.

“It can be a big morale boost, for sure,” Oleksiak said.

That aside, he added, shot blocking requires awareness of reading the space around you and knowing a shooter’s angles. He said the cardinal rule when attempting a block is taking the far side angle away and letting the goaltender handle anything to his short side.

“My first couple of years in Dallas I was trying to get in front of everything, and I think it kind of worked to our detriment,” Oleksiak said. “Sometimes it’s better to let the goalie see certain angles and not risk having a puck deflect off you. So, you’ve got to talk with the goalies about what their preferences are.”

Shot blocking has increased significantly in the NHL, becoming a more systematic part of defensive strategy – as witnessed by the Kraken’s widespread numbers throughout the lineup -- rather than back in the day when one or two brave souls carried the load. Equipment padding has also gotten thicker, while facial visors, once frowned upon in the 1980s and 1990s, are now standard.

Kraken head coach Lane Lambert, who played as an NHL forward in the 1980s and 1990s, offered a tongue-in-cheek explanation for why shot-blocking is on the rise.

“Maybe because they now keep the stats on that,” he quipped.

On a more serious note, Lambert offered up: “If you’re in the right position defensively, there are often times when the puck’s going to hit you. This is, I guess, part of the (defensive) strategy. I mean, there are a lot of teams with a lot of players who block shots, and we’re included in that.”

Lambert isn’t wrong about shot blocking stats being a relatively new phenomenon that players can track and use to promote their abilities come contract negotiation time.

The NHL only began tracking blocked shots in 2005-06, when just six teams averaged more than 14 blocks per 60 minutes over the course of that campaign. Last season, only five teams averaged fewer than 14 blocks.

The Kraken in their 2022-23 playoff season averaged a 25th-best 13.62 such blocks, four fewer per 60-minute game than right now. But in the playoffs, they blocked 18.31 per 60 minutes – fifth best among 16 postseason teams -- and nearly advanced to the Western Conference Final before losing to Dallas in a seven-game second round.

Kraken netminder Matt Murray broke into the NHL a decade ago and feels shot blocking has definitely “become a part of the schematics” in defensive approaches. Murray said teams try to counteract offensive advantages enhanced by technology on the video and analytics side. Offensive players, he said, are better at being more deceptive and finding areas of the ice where goals are more likely.

So, the key is keeping pucks away from those areas by blocking shots or pass attempts. Murray cautions that goalies and defenders need to be on the same page.

“There are times where if they’re trying to block it from the wrong position, it can be a real disadvantage,” he said.

Murray mentioned watching game highlights this week from the prior night’s NHL schedule and seeing one team’s defender standing too close in front of his goalie while trying in vain to block a shot.

“It was like he was trying to play goalie,” Murray said. “And from that angle, there’s still so much net and all he’s doing is taking the goalie’s eyes away. So, it’s a shot that would have been stopped had the guy not tried to block it.”

Murray agreed with Lindgren that “shading the far side” of a shot from a good scoring position and allowing the goalie the short side is pretty much a rule-of-thumb when attempting a block. It’s much easier, he said, for the goalie to move a small distance to his short side for a save than “to go all the way back across the grain” to the far post.

As for Kraken defenseman Lindgren, he won’t even try blocking a shot if the shooter is far enough out and no other opponent is near the net.

“I just let the goalie see it,” he said. “You don’t want to sit there and screen them.”

But when the game is on the line, he won’t hesitate to throw his body in front of any incoming frozen rubber. In fact, he’d be mad at himself for not doing it.

“I think it’s something that guys really take pride in,” Lindgren said. “Games are just so tight and so crucial nowadays. You’re up by a goal late and guys are just throwing everything into it.”

Including, at times, a face primed for some stitches.