Dylan Guenther scored on a breakaway with 48 seconds remaining in overtime as the Arizona Coyotes rallied for a 2-1 victory against the Seattle Kraken on Friday night in Tempe, Ariz.
Arizona’s Clayton Keller tallied his sixth goal in the past six games at 18:52 of the third period with the goalie pulled and an extra attacker on the ice to tie the score and force overtime.
Goaltender Karel Vejmelka made 27 saves for the Coyotes (29-36-5, 63 points), who have won three of their past four games.
The late heroics spoiled the first NHL goal for Seattle’s Ryker Evans and the return of goalie Joey Daccord, the former Arizona State University standout. Daccord stopped 24 of 26 shots but it wasn’t enough as the Kraken (28-28-13, 69 points) remained winless in their past seven games (0-5-2).
Guenther, who helped lead the Western Hockey League’s Seattle Thunderbirds to the Memorial Cup last season, the championship of major junior hockey, took a stretch pass from Logan Cooley and skated alone down the left wing. He put a wrist shot over Daccord’s catching glove for the winner.
Keller tied it after Nick Bjugstad drove the puck down the left wing and put a high backhander on net, with Daccord making the save. But Keller arrived at the top of the crease just as the rebound dropped to the ice and batted it past Daccord.
Evans, a defenseman who was a second-round draft pick in 2021, was in the lineup because Vince Dunn missed his eighth consecutive game with an upper-body injury.
Evans scored at 7:40 of the third period after teammate Andre Burakovsky rang a shot from the slot off the crossbar. Evans tracked down the puck in the left wing corner and fed Jaden Schwartz behind the net. Schwartz moved the puck to Jared McCann in the right faceoff circle and he sent a cross-ice pass back to Evans for a wrist shot from just outside the left faceoff dot that soared over a sprawling Vejmelka, who launched his stick in the air in an attempt to stop the shot.
–Field Level Media
