The Seattle Kraken and the Utah Mammoth mix it up in the second period at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City on Sat Jan 17, 2026 (AP News photo)

By Tom Walker

SALT LAKE CITY– Utah Mammoth veteran defenseman Nate Schmidt scored two goals and two assists in Utah’s Saturday matinee slaughter of the Seattle Kraken 6-3.

The Mammoth (24-20-4) took to the ice at Delta Center for an early Saturday afternoon tilt against the visiting Kraken (21-16-9). The new year has been good to Utah thus far where they have gone 4-0-1 at home and 6-1-1 overall.

The first minute of the first period wasn’t so good to Utah as the Mammoth didn’t seem quite ready to go and Jordan Eberle put the puck past Karel Vejmelka at 1:07 for his 17th goal of the season, assisted by Kaapo Kakko and Matty Beniers, to go up early 1-0.

At 2:36 of the period, Brandon Tanev was whistled for hooking against Ben Myers. Though Seattle won the ensuing faceoff in their offensive zone, Mammoth defenseman Ian Cole recovered the puck and passed to Lawson Crouse who went the length of the ice, passing at the last moment to Kevin Stenlund who easily tipped the puck past Kraken netminder Philipp Grubauer for the shorthander, his fourth goal of the season to even things up 1-1.

It was Utah’s fourth short-handed goal on the season. Almost immediately following the ensuing faceoff, Mammoth forward Jack McBain joined Tanev in the sin bin for cross-checking against Shane Wright, putting Utah in the position of defending a 5-on-3 power play for a minute and 37 seconds, but the Mammoth managed to kill off both penalties to maintain the tie score which carried through the balance of the period. Grubauer and Vejmelka each finished the period stopping 11 of 12 opponent shots.

Utah came out flying to begin the second period, with defenseman Nate Schmidt delivering a perfect impression of Mikhail Sergachev just 28 seconds in, firing a missile from the offensive corner between the faceoff circle and blue line to beat Grubauer and give the Mammoth their first lead of the game.

The 34-year-old defenseman in his thirteenth season tallied his third goal on the year, assisted by Dylan Guenther and Michael Carcone, with his wife and kids in the stands watching dad play the early afternoon game.

At 4:31, Utah forward Nick Schmaltz made it 3-1, banging in a rebound off a shot by Crouse for his 18th goal of the season, with the additional assist to Schmidt, the 200th helper of his career. Courtesy the Mammoth stat crew, Schmidt joins Torey Krug (STL) and Neal Poink (WPG) as the only undrafted active defensemen to achieve that milestone.

Kraken forward Matty Beniers brought the Kraken back to within a point with his 10th goal of the season at 15:11 of the period, assisted by Vince Dunn and Berkly Catton, and with a little more than two minutes remaining in the period, Chandler Stephenson completed the comeback, putting the pack past Vejmelka’s glove hand for his 13th goal of the season, assisted by Freddy Goudreau and Eeli Tolvanen, sending both teams to their locker rooms tied up at 3-3. Once again, Grubauer and Vejmelka kept pace with one another, each stopping 5 of 7 opponent shots during the frame.

Saturday’s tilt was neck-and-neck until 14:30 of the third period when Schmidt netted his second goal of the game, assisted by Clayton Keller, to go up 4-3. 42 seconds later, Schmidt and Keller assisted on the 12th goal of the season by Crouse to pad Utah’s lead 5-3 with under five minutes to go.

With Grubauer pulled for the extra attacker, Barrett Hayton scored his 5th of the season into an empty net with 51 seconds left, assisted by John Marino and netminder Karel Vejmelka, to put the game away for good at 6-3.

The assist was the second of the year for Veggie, who stopped 18 of 21 shots on the night and now leads all NHL goalies with 23 victories. Seattle managed only two shots on goal in the final frame. With the victory, Utah is now 5-0-1 on the current homestand and 7-1-1 in 2016.

In the Utah locker room, Mammoth forward Lawson Crouse talked about how adversity has shaped the team. “We talked about coming into the third, and we came back to our game, and we did that. There were parts throughout the game that we didn’t love, but (we) came away with (a) big two points.” On defenseman Nate Schmidt’s big night, Crouse praised him as “a wise veteran who brings a lot to our locker room, and a very hard-working, team-first guy.” Crouse continued, “Obviously, very happy to see him get rewarded, and we were all cheering for him to get that empty-net at the end there, but the defenseman made a nice play grabbing it down.”

Schmidt, whose four-point night tied a personal best (he had a four assist game with the Vegas Golden Knights in 2019), talked about the adjustments the team has been making. “I think as the year’s gone on, we’ve gotten into situations where we’re not panicking. We’re a little more poised with pucks late in games. It’s something you have to have. As you grow as a team, that’s got to be something that grows with you. That was a really big part of today’s game. You could look at the first couple periods and we liked some parts of our game, didn’t like some other parts. But in order to get there in the third (period), tie ballgame at home, that’s the way you want to finish it off.” Schmidt has found chemistry with defensive linemate John Marino, of whom he said after quickly checking to make sure he was no longer in the locker room, “He is such a calm, poised, cool, collected guy back there. We really do a lot of chatter and a lot of communication, whether it’s on the ice or off the ice. I feel like he always says he can hear me on the ice, which is always a plus. Sometimes it’s too much, but I tell him it’s never (too much).” Playing his first season in the Beehive State, Schmidt was asked how much he enjoys playing here so far. “It’s been great. … I think the way that this organization has built itself and how it has started and set the standard for how they want to move forward, how the team wants to move forward long after I’m gone…It is quite a testament to not only the fans, but to the Smiths and everybody they’ve brought in here so far.” Schmidt said that he didn’t know if his kids would remember his four-point afternoon, but was happy that they were able to wave to one another during the game, and he will remember it forever.

Head Coach André Tourigny opened his post-game comments by saying, “A big win. It’s a team we’re racing with, so it’s an important win. It’s a big two points. I liked the way we were opportunistic, and we found a way to score a big goal in that key moment. We didn’t start the way we wanted. They scored, and then we scored a big goal on the PK. That settled us a little bit because we didn’t have the best start. Early in the second, we scored a big goal to loosen up our game a little bit, and in the third period, obviously, we had a good push.” On the penalty killing unit, which scored a goal and withstood a lengthy 5-on-3 kill, Bear said, “Huge. The moment they scored the goal in the PK, it wasn’t just scoring a goal on the PK. At that moment, we were a little bit on our heels, to say the least. … I think one of the key moments was the five-on-three. There’s no doubt about it. I think that was a huge moment for us. I think that the momentum definitely shifted quickly. When they scored after our power play, we missed our chance. We could have put a nail in the coffin on the power play, and we had good chances, but we didn’t. Right away, they scored on the next shift, so that shifts the momentum. They scored right away after. It made the third period a little bit more interesting.”

Utah (25-20-4) will play its seventh and final game of the current homestand next Wednesday when they face off against the Philadelphia Flyers (22-17-8).