The LA Kings battled from three goals down to earn a point on the road, though they ultimately fell by a 4-3 final score in the shootout on Monday evening against the Minnesota Wild. <\/p>\n
With just under six minutes remaining in the opening period, Minnesota capitalized with a power-play goal as early penalties again hurt the Kings. Wild forward Marcus Johansson had his shot from the slot blocked by the Los Angeles penalty killers, but the puck deflected out to the point, held in by defenseman Jared Spurgeon. Spurgeon drifted into the right-hand circle, waited for a screen to develop and placed his shot into the back of the net for an early 1-0 lead. <\/p>\n
The Wild added two more goals, both coming on the pwoer play, to take a 3-0 lead into the first intermission.<\/p>\n
First, Minnesota scored a 5-on-3 goal as forward Kirill Kaprizov circled the wagons in the offensive zone, worked his way to the center point and shot through traffic and in, past Kings goaltender Darcy Kuemper, for his third goal of the season. Forward Matt Boldy made it 3-0 Wild as he drove towards the goal line and snuck a shot inside the near post, past Kuemper on the glove side, to put the hosts ahead by three goals through 20 minutes of play, as early penalties again put the Kings in a hole. <\/p>\n
After neither team scored in the middle stanza, the Kings were finally able to turn offensive-zone pressure into a goal early in the third period as forward Kevin Fiala cashed in against his former club. After a good shift in the offensive zone, Fiala got on the end of a loose puck and as he was knocked to the ice, he slid it between the legs of Minnesota goaltender Jesper Wallstedt and in for his second goal of the season and a 3-1 game. <\/p>\n
Skating on the man advantage, the Kings pulled another goal back as forward Quinton Byfield buried his second goal of the season. On what was one of the best power-play sequences the Kings have had this season, forward Adrian Kempe found Byfield in the slot, stationed as the bumper man on the top unit, and Byfield hammered a one-timer past Wallstedt and in to pull the visitors within a goal. <\/p>\n
With Kuemper pulled for the extra attacker, the Kings found a way to tie things up late in the third period in a 6-on-5 situation, earning and point and sending the game into overtime. Forward Anze Kopitar fed Drew Doughty across the blueline for a one timer, that was kept out, but after Quinton Byfield worked it loose in front, Kempe crashed the net and buried the game-tying goal from the slot, his second in as many games, to complete the three-goal comeback and force overtime. <\/p>\n
The extra session saw the Kings collect the bulk of the chances, including several looks on an abbreviated 4-on-3 power play, but neither team scored as the game went into a shootout. Neither team scored in the first three rounds before forward Marco Rossi netted the only goal in Round 4 to secure his team the extra point.<\/p>\n
Hear from Byfield, Doughty and Head Coach Jim Hiller following tonight\u2019s game. <\/p>\n
Drew Doughty <\/p>\n
Quinton Byfield
On the team\u2019s effort to comeback in the third period
It was good on us, for sure, but we can\u2019t put ourselves in those holes. We\u2019re taking too many penalties and I might be the main guy, I\u2019ve taken a ton. So, that\u2019s something that we\u2019ve got to fix and you can\u2019t be in those holes, but obviously it\u2019s good resilience to get that point back. It\u2019s better to take one point back than nothing. <\/p>\n
On what he feels the team need to do to limit the minor penalties overall
It\u2019s early season, they\u2019re looking to call a lot of penalties but we\u2019re not making it easy on ourselves either. There\u2019s just some stick checking, we\u2019ve just got to be a little bit more ready, battle a little bit more, move our feet and maybe get rid of some of those. Other than that, every game we\u2019ve played 5-on-5, I feel like we\u2019ve outplayed the other teams, so we\u2019ve just got to clean that up.<\/p>\n
On what he saw on his power-play goal tonight
I just saw Juice just kind of walking down far side there, I just wanted to kind of push away from the defenders. He made a hard pass and I just tried putting it on net. I think I went low, far side, so it was lucky, but that was a big one for us. It was good for the power play. <\/p>\n
On if the 5-on-5 play tonight gives a building block to move forward on
I think it\u2019s just, honestly, it\u2019s when we put our head down and we just went to work. We got it behind them and we just forechecked and that\u2019s when we kind of started turning the tide. Then everything else opened up, so I think we just have to start with that.<\/p>\n
Jim Hiller
On what he liked most about the way the team fought back to earn a point4
You like lots about it, right? If you take away the start, which you can\u2019t, it\u2019s part of the game, I get that, but the last 50 minutes, if that\u2019s what you want to call it, you like lots about it. We didn\u2019t give them much and we didn\u2019t create a whole bunch, but obviously we created enough. I\u2019d have liked to see us score on the 4-on-3, we had some good looks, that would have made it a great night. In the end, we can\u2019t be satisfied with just one. <\/p>\n
On what he can takeaway from this game when the team played 5-on-5
We\u2019re taking too many penalties and we\u2019re getting scored on. I think the one positive there is we had a really good kill in the third period to hold it. 5-on-5, Winnipeg didn\u2019t have much, Minnesota didn\u2019t have much, so our 5-on-5 game is starting to feel a little bit more like how we play. We\u2019re going to score goals, I\u2019m not worried about that, but we just have to tighten it up. I think we\u2019re getting there. We take some of the penalties away, we\u2019ll be a good team. <\/p>\n
On what can be done collectively to reduce the number of penalties
Sometimes, when it rains, it pours. It started that way last season too. I think in the last 30 games, we took the least amount of minors to put it short. I don\u2019t know what it is. I can tell you I talked about it two days ago and that\u2019s why I don\u2019t like to talk about these things, because we took seven penalties in the first period of the next two games. There were some calls I didn\u2019t really agree with, I would tell you that, so there\u2019s some borderline calls, but, hey, we\u2019re getting called, so we\u2019re just going to have to clean that up completely. We can\u2019t even be close.<\/p>\n
On how he felt the new-look defensive pairs looked in Game 1 together
We played pretty well 5-on-5, they didn\u2019t have a lot, so we\u2019ll review it to get a real deep dive on exactly how it looked, but from the bench, there wasn\u2019t much going on in our end. So, the defenseman, along with the forwards helping them out, did a really good job. We didn\u2019t give much up, that\u2019s the sign. I don\u2019t care who plays with who, if you don\u2019t give much up, you\u2019ve had a good night, wherever anybody\u2019s playing.<\/p>\n
On Quinton Byfield\u2019s power-play goal and the movement leading up to it
Juice ended up down there, that\u2019s usually Kuzy\u2019s spot, he made a nice play. Q actually faded out a little bit and didn\u2019t hold himself under the hash. Just a really good play, just a really nice goal, good execution. That\u2019s what you need to do when you\u2019re on the power play. It\u2019s really all about execution. Doesn\u2019t matter who\u2019s where, when you get your chance, you have to execute. Then, we missed a couple on the 4-on-3, where we hit skates and we just weren\u2019t quite as sharp. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Notes \u2013
\u2013 Forward Kevin Fiala (1-0=1) scored the Kings\u2019 first goal of the evening and extended his point streak against the Minnesota Wild to a seventh game (3-6=9), dating back to Oct. 19, 2023. Fiala has now tied Anze Kopitar (2-9=11 in 7 GP from Feb. 24, 2011 \u2013 April 4, 2013) and Jack Johnson (2-6=8 in 7 GP from Feb. 24, 2009 \u2013 Oct. 25, 2010) for the longest point streak by an LA King against Minnesota in franchise history.
\u2013 Forward Quinton Byfield (1-1=2) netted both his second goal and second assist of the campaign tonight at Grand Casino Arena, marking his fifth and sixth points (2-4=6) against the Wild through 10 career matchups.
\u2013 Forward Adrian Kempe (1-1=2) picked up his third assist of the year on Byfield\u2019s goal before scoring his second goal of the season to knot the game 3-3 with 46 seconds remaining in regulation. Kempe\u2019s marker stands as the Kings\u2019 latest game-tying goal since March 13, 2022, when Martin Frk scored with 32 seconds left (59:28) in a 3-2 shootout win over the Florida Panthers, per NHL PR. The native of Kramfors, Sweden now has 15 career points (7-8=15) in 16 career road games against the Wild.
\u2013 Forward Joel Armia (0-1=1) picked up his second helper of the season while defenseman Brandt Clarke registered his first assist of the campaign on Fiala\u2019s tally. Clarke\u2019s 28 helpers and 33 points led all Kings defensemen last season.
\u2013 Captain Anze Kopitar (0-1=1) extended his season-opening point streak to a fourth game (0-4=4) with an assist on Byfield\u2019s power play goal, marking the sixth season-opening streak of at least that length in his two-decade career. Additionally, Kopitar became the fourth player age 38 or older to record a season-opening assist streak of at least four games in NHL history per NHL PR. He joins Larry Robinson (6 GP in 1989- 90), Teppo Numminen (4 GP in 2008-09) and Jean Beliveau (4 GP in 1970-71). With his assist, Kopitar earned his 1,282nd career point (440-842=1,282) to break a tie with Alex Delvecchio (456-825=1,281) for sole possession of 39th most in League history.
\u2013 Kopitar played in his 1,458th regular season NHL game tonight, breaking a tie with Glen Wesley (1,147 GP) for sole possession of the 30th most games played in League history.
\u2013 Defenseman Drew Doughty (0-1=1) extended his assist streak to a third consecutive game with his third helper of the campaign. The veteran blueliner has 13 points (2-11=13) in his last 12 games against the Wild. Through 57 career games against Minnesota, the veteran blueliner has accumulated seven goals and 39 points (7-32=39), the second most points against the Wild by a defenseman in League history behind Roman Josi (16-27=43).<\/p>\n
The Kings have a scheduled team off day tomorrow and will return to the ice on Wednesday, October 15 for practice at 11 AM Toyota Sports Performance Center in El Segundo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The LA Kings battled from three goals down to earn a point on the road, though they ultimately…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":212270,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-212269","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=212269"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212269\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/212270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=212269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=212269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=212269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}