Seattle Kraken announce full inaugural season schedule, home opener October 23

The Seattle Kraken announced the team’s full-season schedule this week, following the massive expansion draft event at Seattle’s Gas Works Park.

The brand-new team will kick off their season on the road, starting with a game against the other newest team in hockey, the Vegas Golden Knights, in Sin City on October 12. Following the team’s debut, the Kraken will play four more games — against Nashville, Columbus, Philadelphia and New Jersey, in that order — before arriving home at Climate Pledge Area in October.

The newly refurbished bowl at Climate Pledge Arena will play host to the immediate rival team — the Vancouver Canuks on October 23. The Kraken will play three more home games to round out the month of October. These face-offs include opponents from Montreal, who just competed for the Stanley Cup, Minnesota and New York, when the Rangers come to Seattle on Halloween.

Seattle enters the league a new member of the Pacific Divison. Other teams in this division include the Vancouver Canuks, the Los Angeles Kings, Anaheim Ducks, San Jose Sharks, Vegas Golden Knights, Edmonton Oilers and the Calgary Flames.The Kraken will play the rival Canuks a total of four times. After their initial meeting on October 23, the teams won’t meet again until December 27 north of the border. Climate Pledge Arena will host the ‘Nuks again on January 1, before the two teams have their final matchup in Vancouver on April 26.

The Kraken will face two of their division rivals three times: the Edmonton Oilers and Anaheim Ducks. Seattle will host the Oilers twice and meet them in Alberta just once. Conversely, the Ducks will waddle up to Seattle for just one game and host the Kraken in Orange County for two. The Kraken will play the remaining teams of the division — Canuks, Kings, Sharks, Golden Knights and Flames — four times each during the season.

The Kraken will also face all the teams in the Central Divison three times each. The Central Division — which includes the Colorado Avalanche, Minnesota Wild, Winnipeg Jets, Nashville Predators, Chicago Blackhawks, Dallas Stars, St. Louis Blues and the Arizona Coyotes — make up the other half of the NHL’s Western Conference.

As for the Eastern Conference, the Kraken will play each team once at home and once on the road. The “Original Six” — a term to describe the founding six teams of the National Hockey League; the Canadiens (“Habs”), Maple Leafs, Bruins, Red Wings, Blackhawks, and Rangers which comprised the league from 1942 to 1967 — will see two games to round out the October homestand when the Habs and Rangers visit.

If the February schedule seems barren, there’s a reason for that. The NHL left a wide gap in the schedule to allow for players to travel to Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics. However, following the commotion of the 2020 summer games in Tokyo, the NHL has developed a second, non-publicized schedule should the games be altered, or if there’s a decision for NHL players to not participate in the Olympics.

In total, the Kraken will play 82 games over seven months. Should the Olympic break happen, the newest NHL team will see nine games in October, 13 in November, 14 in December, 16 in January, three in February, 13 in March and 14 in April. It’s not known when the final decision on the Olympics will be made or when the alternate schedule will be made available to the public.

On Thursday, six of the players drafted by the Kraken in Wednesday's expansion draft attended the Seattle Mariners baseball game. In attendance were the same players who were present at the event at Gas Works Park: Jordan Eberle, Mark Giordano, Jamie Oleksiak, Haydn Fleury, Brandon Tanev and Chris Dreidger in respective order in the above photo.