Matty Beniers scores, fights, but Kraken suffer loss to Predators

Kate Shefte, The Seattle Times on Mar 11, 2026

Published in Hockey

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Matty Beniers picked up his first NHL fight and was an assist away from a “Gordie Howe hat trick,” but it came in a potentially costly 4-2 loss to the Nashville Predators.

Beniers, with his smaller frame and big role, is usually the one watching teammates step up to defend him. But he was clearly upset by an illegal cross check on linemate Jared McCann and dropped the gloves with Justin Barron. The “Gordie Howe,” an informal hockey stat, is a goal, an assist and a fight, and Beniers had scored in the first period.

Seattle led 2-0 at the first intermission, but trailed by the second period break and never recovered. The Kraken lost their third straight.

Seattle center Shane Wright put a harmless shot on net but it got the ball rolling. He wound up banking a shot off goaltender Juuse Saros’s pads, under a Nashville stick and directly to lurking teammate Kaapo Kakko. Kakko scored on fellow Olympic bronze medalist Saros 2:14 into the game.

Beniers scored a gorgeous goal to make it 2-0. While straddling the red line, he whipped the baddest of bad-angle shots into the far corner of the Nashville net.

The Kraken were cruising, but the second period was a rough one. Seattle defenseman Ryker Evans lost his balance at the worst possible moment and went sliding into Saros as Shane Wright scored. Goaltender interference is often in the eye of the beholder, but there was no hesitation or debate between the officials this time. The goal was immediately waved off.

The Predators’ Reid Schaefer, a former Seattle Thunderbird, tied the game at 2 almost immediately. Nashville then went up 3-2 when Ryan Ufko dangled Seattle forward Ryan Winterton and scored his first NHL goal.

The Kraken tested Saros over the next 25 minutes and came close several times. The fourth Nashville goal was an empty-netter.

Joey Daccord made 23 stops for Seattle.

The Kraken are 2-5 coming out of a multiweek Olympic break but managed to hold onto the second wild-card spot in the West, with help from the teams chasing them in the standings. None of those squads are heating up either. Los Angeles did catch up to Seattle on Tuesday following an overtime loss in Boston. Both teams have 67 points but the Kraken have played one fewer game.

Tuesday’s game would have been a good one to win for Seattle. Nashville is one of the teams close behind the Kraken, and Seattle could have gotten some distance on San Jose, which lost in regulation.

For the second time since he was acquired at the NHL trade deadline, Bobby McMann did not suit up for Seattle. His Kraken debut has been pushed back nearly a week due to visa issues. Seattle got him from the Toronto Maple Leafs, where the Wainwright, Alberta native played all 200 of his NHL games.

By the time McMann gets into the lineup, he will have missed a week of action at best. Toronto scratched him from the lineup twice last week while finalizing his trade.

Speaking of scratches, Kraken dusted off Matt Murray’s mug for the first time in a long while. Murray, an offseason free-agent signing, entered the season as the Kraken’s third goaltender. He made only four starts before exiting the lineup with a lower-body injury in November. At the time, he was expected to miss six weeks. He has been well enough to practice with the team for several months.

The Kraken activated him from long-term injured reserve Tuesday before the game and he was a healthy scratch against Nashville. Murray carries a 0-2-1 record with a 2.21 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage.

Every night, just before the opening faceoff, a special guest cranks an authentic Engine Order Telegraph (EOT) device once used on a Washington state ferry to the words “let’s go Kraken.” The machine was once used to send signals from the deck down to the engine room.

On Tuesday, in honor of Women in Hockey Knight, it was Torrent forward Hannah Bilka doing the honors. The American Olympian sustained an upper-body injury while winning gold and earning tournament All-Star honors at last month’s Winter Games.

Climate Pledge Arena will unfortunately be seeing less of her going forward, as she was ruled out of the Torrent lineup for the remainder of the 2025-26 PWHL season on Tuesday. In 14 regular season games with Seattle, the 24-year-old from Coppell, TX contributed four goals and five assists. It’s another blow to the last-place Torrent, who are already missing captain Hilary Knight due to a lower-body injury suffered during the Olympics.

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