Kraken’s Ryan Winterton takes leave of absence
The Seattle Kraken will be without one of their young forwards for some time.
On Monday, the team announced that Ryan Winterton will be taking a temporary leave of absence to attend to a family matter.
An update on #SeaKraken forward Ryan Winterton.
Winterton, 22, has missed Seattle’s last two games due to an illness.
In 62 games this season, the Markham, Ontario native has four goals and 14 assists for 18 points. Last season, he had just an assist in 12 games for the Kraken, but spent the majority of the season with the AHL’s Coachella Valley Firebirds, where he registered 18 goals and 19 assists for 37 points in 56 games.
Winterton was Seattle’s third-round pick in their inaugural draft class of 2021. In February, the Kraken signed him to a two-year contract extension which will carry an average annual value of $1.125 million.
After a three-year junior career in the OHL, Winteron’s first professional season came in 2023-24, when he notched 22 goals and 13 assists for 35 points in 58 games for Coachella Valley. He also went scoreless over nine games with Seattle that season.
Winterton spent the first two years of his OHL career with the Hamilton Bulldogs, including a breakout 2021-22 campaign in which he scored 20 goals and added 26 assists for 46 points in 37 games. He also contributed seven goals and 12 assists for 19 points in 18 postseason games en route to Hamilton winning the J. Ross Robertson Cup as OHL champions that season. He played his final junior season for the London Knights in 2022-23, when he registered 12 goals and 24 assists for 36 points in 34 games.
With 71 points through 69 games, the Kraken sit four points back of the second wild card spot in the Western Conference.
Seattle will continue its six-game road trip when they visit the Florida Panthers on Tuesday.