Kings coach Jim Hiller seems like the kind of steady hand who would not let his players have any excuses in mind as they came into the second game of back-to-backs. And indeed, the Kings came out flying on Sunday at an odd-for-LA 6pm start time. They even opened a lead against unfamiliar opponent the Philadelphia Flyers, also playing their second game in a row. The Philly team was in Anaheim on Saturday to take a 3-1 victory.
Just to hedge his bet, Hiller did what is the statistically smart thing and changed his goalie. In was David Rittich and in the back-up role was Darcy Kuemper, who won Saturday afternoon in OT versus the Oilers. Rittich was not tested early, and most of the play was at the other end of the ice from where he was stationed.
Still, the score of the first period was 2-2, with only seven shots registered for the visitors versus six for the home squad. What happened? The Kings scored two beautiful goals, split by Philly’s first tally and complemented by their second.
The first LA goal showed a very interested (sometimes, he’s not so engaged) Kevin Fiala ripping a wrister to the net as he had done earlier on a shot saved by goalie Aleksei Kolosov. Fiala put the puck to the long side, just barely inside the post about two feet high. It was made possible by Alex Laferriere’s play to go behind the net and pick up the puck, then skate it to the left side to feed it out to Fiala.
The first Flyers goal was the result of a reaching defensive effort by Vladislav Gavrikov, who could quite readily have hauled Tyson Foerster down on the play and not have been criticized for it. Foerster carried on to the net and pushed a puck under Big Save Dave. To be fair to the nickname, Rittich had made a good stop early on a puck that went right-to-left across his crease.
The second Philadelphia goal was a pure hustle play, with a little luck thrown in as the puck went to the crease and knocked in off a crashing Scott Laughton.
The second Kings goal was equally a display of skill as their first had been. Adrian Kempe got a pass from the defense on a rush and laced a one-timer slap shot into the Flyers net.
The second period was action all the way to halfway, with the best shift of the lot being when Byfield ended up out with Kempe and Alex Turcotte (in other words, when Byfield appeared briefly in Kopitar’s spot).
Byfield would later find himself playing alongside Kempe and Kopitar, something Hiller explained by saying, “It just was a feeling…. I wanted to get Quinton out there. I hadn’t played him a lot…. Getting him with [Kopitar and Kempe] I felt that as a line, they would get something going.”
Saturday night after the game versus Edmonton, someone asked Hiller if seeing Byfield control the puck put him at ease that things will be OK when Kopitar ends his career. (His contract runs through next year.) Hiller said, “I don’t think of it like that,” about Kopitar’s contract or about Byfield being the “new Kopi,” but seeing Byfield dominate a shift with puck possession sure made the point relevant once more.
As the second period wore on, the Flyers opened a 4-2 lead on goals by Matvei Michkov and Joel Farabee. The first was a bit of a fluke, going in off Rittich from behind the net, and the second a pure out-hustle by the Flyers. Even with players draped over them, two Philly players were able to get the puck to the net, and into it.
After the game, Coach Hiller was asked whether he thought of calling a time out at that point to settle the team down. “There wouldn’t have been much to say, frankly. We were playing pretty well. We gave up a bad chance, and they scored.”
Were the Kings just exhausted? Warren Foegele didn’t think so, as he scored by grabbing a turnover (a blind behind-the-back pass that Coach Tortorella of the Flyers will surely make someone pay for) and rushing down the ice. His low shot was saved by the goalie’s leg, but Foegele grabbed a rebound and put it in high in the net. 4-3, on what seemed like more than 29 combined shots (14 Flyers, 15 Kings). It was an entertaining game through two, though a bit of a coach’s nightmare both directions.
Period three saw Anze Kopitar score twice to take the Kings to 5-4. The first goal kind of hit him and rode its way into the net on his momentum. The second was a tip on the power play off a shot from the point by Kempe, a floater that Kopitar picked out of the air for his 12th of the year.
The Kings have now won seven in a row at home. About the Kings’ success in coming from behind and then knowing how to shut it down, the coach put it down to team bonding, saying, “Some years, it feels like you never get it how you want to get it, but this year, it feels like we have.”
Notes
The teams combined for only 41 shots despite the nine goals.
The Kings will face New Jersey in LA on New Year’s Day.
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