Jim Hiller had a line that resonated with me after yesterday\u2019s win over Ottawa.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe game, to me, is very similar to probably about five of them here that we\u2019ve had that maybe we\u2019ve come up short by a goal.\u201d<\/p>\n
It made me think about how the team has struggled to win games at home. They\u2019ve played nine games in Los Angeles this season and won just two. If you were to rank those nine games by how well the Kings played, the 3-0 win over Winnipeg probably sits at the top, but although the Kings won last night against Ottawa, I don\u2019t think that means it was the second-best game the Kings have played here this season, just like that. The Kings dominated Detroit and New Jersey but lost both games. They should\u2019ve comfortable beaten Pittsburgh but lost on small mistakes. Even against Boston, the Kings should\u2019ve won that game by multiple goals and didn\u2019t. So I understand Hiller\u2019s point. While it\u2019s nice to win, it doesn\u2019t mean that every time the Kings have lost it\u2019s been a poor performance, or that just because they won, it means they suddenly played better. <\/p>\n
He referenced multiple times that he felt last night\u2019s game was very similar to some others played at home this season. The difference was that Brandt Clarke delivered a power-play goal late that secured the two points. So often this season, the Kings have had chances or moments to win games and they have not taken them, many times on the man advantage. Last night, it wasn\u2019t really all that different in how they played, but they took their chance to win the game. <\/p>\n
\u201cYou could be talking about, man, he didn\u2019t get the goal and it was a hard-fought game and what\u2019s wrong, but when the puck goes in, now we\u2019re celebrating the results.\u201d <\/p>\n
Indeed.<\/p>\n
The puck went in, so we\u2019re talking about the result being a good one. But it wasn\u2019t as if last night was really any different than the Boston game. Both games were low-scoring and tightly-contested. Not an \u201cA-Game\u201d offensively speaking. There were similarities to some other games the Kings have played at home as well. There were attempts, there were high-danger chances from top-quality players, ample opportunities to lead by more. But once again, there was a dearth of goals scored.<\/p>\n
In games played at home, the Kings rank fourth in the NHL in shot attempts per\/60 minutes played. They\u2019re also in the league\u2019s Top-10 in high-danger chances. <\/p>\n
Goals scored, though? The Kings rank 31st. PDO, which combines shooting percentage and save percentage? The Kings rank 31st. No team in the league has a worse disparity at home between actual goals per\/60 and expected goals per\/60 than the Kings, who are -1.3 per 60 minutes played at home this season. <\/p>\n
Depending on your point of view, I think that represents one of two things with the Kings right now. If you\u2019re a glass half full person, you\u2019d look at it very optimistically. You\u2019d see a team that, despite averaging under two goals per game at home this season, is on pace for 100 points, sitting just one point out of the division lead in the Pacific Division, with a head-to-head matchup against the current leaders coming up on Friday. You\u2019d look at an unsustainably low set of metrics and several players scoring below their career metrics and understand that a regression towards the mean is far more likely than not. And with that regression towards the mean, you\u2019re taking a team on pace for 100 points and trending upwards\u2026\u2026while it\u2019s been far from perfect, that should be pretty exciting. <\/p>\n
If you\u2019re on the other side of the glass, you\u2019ll point to a team that doesn\u2019t have a ton of natural finishers who are simply not finishing, especially at home. For a team that was built to deliver depth scoring offensively, they really haven\u2019t gotten goals from anywhere in the lineup, they\u2019ve just gotten enough in key moments to win close games or force close games into overtime. You\u2019d likely look back instead of ahead and point to a body of work that doesn\u2019t scream change, rather than the law of averages theory.<\/p>\n
The truth, as always, lies somewhere in the middle.<\/p>\n
Over the last four seasons, even the NHL\u2019s worst teams averaged North of two goals per\/60 at home over 41 games. In that span, only three teams in total \u2013 San Jose, Anaheim and Chicago in 2023-24 \u2013 averaged below 2.5 goals per\/60 at home. Those were the three worst teams in the NHL by far. So, even going off the barometer of say the fourth-worst team offensively at home over the last four seasons, the Kings would improve by nearly a half-goal per\/60 at home just by hitting that super-low barometer. And that is the bare minimum. Eventually, things will swing upwards in that area. <\/p>\n
However, you\u2019ve also got to see the change. Someone has to be the change or in this case, multiple someones have to be the change. The Kings have seen just about all sources of offense dry up as of late, minus the shorthanded prowess of forward Joel Armia. Adrian Kempe has two goals in his last 14 games and it\u2019s two in 19 for Quinton Byfield. Andrei Kuzmenko has one goal in 14 games, while Trevor Moore hasn\u2019t scored this month and Phillip Danault hasn\u2019t scored this season. They know that and they\u2019re working on changing it, the right way. Lots of guys with room to grow. All players with track records and bodies of work to point to. Even if they don\u2019t hit their career highs or even their career averages, there\u2019s a lot of room between where they\u2019re at and those high-end numbers. But that\u2019s in the past. Looking forward, there\u2019s lots of directions to point in looking for change. <\/p>\n
I guess that\u2019s all to say that in time, we should expect natural improvements, but that can\u2019t be the approach the Kings are taking. They\u2019re working on proactive changes, sticking to their process of how they play but trying to find more goals within that structure and style of play. It\u2019s not easy nor will it be overnight. They\u2019re in a good spot right now despite all of these things and with that foundation, now it\u2019s time to get the offense going to take it to the next level. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jim Hiller had a line that resonated with me after yesterday\u2019s win over Ottawa. \u201cThe game, to me,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":314458,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-314457","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-nhl","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=314457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314457\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/314458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}