Sponsored By
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
GRAND FORKS — Tyler Kleven stepped into a shot Wednesday night.
He got all of it.
ADVERTISEMENT
The former Fargo Davies and UND defenseman drilled a 92 mile-per-hour slap shot from the left circle past San Jose Sharks goaltender Mackenzie Blackwood for his first NHL goal.
Kleven was playing in his 39th NHL game for the Ottawa Senators.
His goal helped the Senators win 4-3 in San Jose, despite registering just 11 shots on goal.
⚠️ FIRST NHL GOAL ALERT ⚠️
Congrats, Tyler Kleven! pic.twitter.com/djWihf2jys
On Kleven’s goal, Senators forward Claude Giroux flipped a backhand pass to Kleven at the top of the left circle. Kleven took two steps and hammered the puck. While Kleven celebrated next to the boards, teammate Drake Batherson fished the puck out of the net to save as a keepsake.
“That was a burden on my back for a long time,” Kleven said in an intermission TV interview. “Just happy to help the team out and score a goal.”
Kleven’s teammates heartily celebrated the goal.
“They’ve been big supporters of me this whole time,” Kleven said in the interview. “I’ve played a lot of games with these guys. I’m just happy to get one on the board.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Kleven played 16:27 in the game.
Kleven played one year of prep hockey at Fargo Davies in 2017-18 as a sophomore.
He moved to the U.S. National Team Development Program for the following two seasons.
Kleven started at UND in 2020, playing his first games in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference Pod in Omaha. Kleven scored his first collegiate goal against Western Michigan.
Kleven played three seasons at UND, gradually increasing his point total. He had seven as a rookie, 10 as a sophomore and 18 as a junior.
After his junior season, he signed a three-year entry-level contract with the Senators and immediately jumped into the NHL. He made his debut in the spring of 2023.
Last season, Kleven played nine games with Ottawa and 53 with its top minor-league affiliate, the Belleville Senators.
ADVERTISEMENT
He’s played exclusively in the NHL this season, suiting up for 22 games.
Kleven plays with three of his former UND teammates in Jacob Bernard-Docker, Jake Sanderson and Shane Pinto. All were in the lineup Wednesday night.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
