It’s an unfortunate reality coming off of the Knights’ incredible inaugural season, but the Kraken are, like most expansion teams, still looking at a long road ahead before reaching the postseason. Unfortunately, the team has struggled to find success on either end of the ice this year, as Philip Grubauer has significantly underperformed in addition to the offense struggling to find any sort of footing. The team signed goaltender Philip Grubauer to a six year deal coming off of his successful year in Colorado- it appeared that General Manager Ron Francis was looking for a strong defensive core to frustrate opponents for the first year of the club. The Kraken drafted their team in July of 2021, mostly picking up defensemen and defensive-minded forwards. Expectations were hopeful for the Kraken to replicate the success of the Knights, but most people recognized that there was a high chance the team would need a few years before they were competitive.
The NHL had seen its first expansion team since 2003 in the Vegas Golden Knights that year, watching as the new team somehow won the Pacific and made it all the way to the 2018 Stanley Cup Finals. Seattle had been petitioning for an NHL expansion team for quite some time, finally getting the green light in 2018 after being approved by the NHL Board of Governors.
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