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Daniel Sprong scores 20 goals and tallies 40 points for first time in career

By Chris Cerullo

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March 31, 2023 7:13 pm

Former Capital Daniel Sprong is a 20-goal scorer in a single season for the first time in his NHL career. The Seattle Kraken winger tallied his 20th of the 2022-23 campaign on Thursday when the Kraken took down the Anaheim Ducks 4-1.

The 26-year-old forward is near the end of his second season with Seattle after being dealt west by the Caps at the 2022 trade deadline.

Sprong put away the milestone marker with 4:18 left in the third period and the Kraken on a power play.

The puck ricocheted right to Sprong at the left point after a shot from Matty Beniers went wide of the Anaheim net. Sprong pounced on the loose biscuit, made a quick move to the top of the left faceoff circle, and fired an absolute snipe past Ducks goaltender Lukas Dostal.

The tally was Sprong’s 40th point of the season as he has also recorded 20 assists in just 58 games for Seattle. Over a full 82-game slate scoring at this pace, Sprong would end the season with 28 goals and 56 total points.

That is incredible value from a player that could not find a home this past offseason until he signed a professional tryout agreement with the Kraken to be able to attend their NHL training camp.

All of that stings even more from a Caps perspective as the Caps have just one player that has reached the 20-goal mark this season and that’s Alex Ovechkin with his team-leading 42 goals. Sprong’s 40 points would also rank fourth on the Caps behind just Ovechkin (72), Dylan Strome (57), and Evgeny Kuznetsov (54).

If you look at Sprong’s season compared to the rest of the league as a whole it gets even more impressive.

Here is the list of players that have a higher points per 60 minutes rate than Sprong (3.7) in the league this season: Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Nikita Kucherov, Nathan MacKinnon, Matthew Tkachuk, David Pastrnak, Tage Thompson, Jason Robertson, Elias Pettersson, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.

If you include just five-on-five scoring, Sprong leads the entire NHL. No one in the league is scoring at a better rate than his 3.24 points per 60 minutes at five-on-five.

Congrats, Daniel!

Headline photo: @sprong11/Instagram

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