The playoffs began for Colorado much like the regular season — some surprise injuries and rusty players couldn’t get the job done against a team motivated to prove themselves against the defending champions.
Sometime between warmups and puck drop, Jack Johnson was deemed unable to play due to injury, and despite coming back into the lineup Cale Makar and Josh Manson were unable to play at the level expected of them.
Couple those difficulties with the Seattle Kraken’s strong forecheck and stingy defense in front of former Colorado Avalanche netminder Philip Grubauer, and you get what you saw tonight - a frustrated Colorado team unable to create space for themselves fell 3-1 to their underdog opponent.