Some notes from last night’s game…
– The Kings lost all of a three-goal, second-period lead, but ended their three-game losing streak with a 4-3 shootout victory over the Boston Bruins on Saturday night.
– The Kings are now 3-0 in shootouts, and Michal Handzus has scored the sudden-death winner in two of the them. Handzus beat the Bruins in the sixth round Saturday, and beat the Minnesota Wild in the fifth round on Oct. 25 in Minnesota.
– The Kings were outshot 41-26, as they allowed a season high in shots on goal. The Kings had outshot their opponents in seven consecutive games but now have a 6-1-0 record in games in which they are outshot.
– The Kings improved to 7-0-0 when leading after two periods and evened their season road record to 5-5-0.
– Special teams went on the “loss” side again for the Kings, who went 0-for-5 on the power play and 4-for-5 on the penalty kill.
– Jonathan Quick stopped 38 of 41 shots, one save short of tying his season high. Quick also stopped all six shootout attempts. Quick improved his personal record this season to 11-2-0, including 5-1-0 on the road.
– Michal Handzus had one goal in addition to his shootout winner. Handzus has two goals in his last three games.
– Brad Richardson had one goal. Richardson had been without a point in 11 consecutive games since his hat trick Oct. 23 at Colorado.
– Jarret Stoll had one goal and has now recorded at least one point in nine of his last 10 games. Stoll has also recorded at least one point in 14 of 19 games this season.
– Kevin Westgarth had a first-period assist for his first career NHL point.
– Trevor Lewis had two assists for his first points of the season and the first multi-point game of his NHL career.
– Rob Scuderi had one assist and now has five assists, all in his last 10 games. Scuderi had 11 assists in 73 games last season.
– Justin Williams had one assist and now has recorded at least one point in 12 of his last 13 games (seven goals, eight assists).
– Davis Drewiske had one assist, his fifth of the season.
– Anze Kopitar and Dustin Brown each had a team-high three shots on goal. Matt Greene was credited with a game-high seven hits and Jack Johnson was credited with a game-high five blocked shots.
– The Kings won 25 of 68 faceoffs (37 percent).
– Drew Doughty played a game-high 29 minutes, 55 seconds (a season high for Doughty). Anze Kopitar led all Kings forwards at 24:34.
37 percent faceoffs…=(
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Getting slaughtered in faceoffs led to a lot of last night’s troubles.
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How to better use in faceoffs!?
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on that 2nd goal by boston on the delayed penalty…didnt quick play the puck that should have stopped the play?
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Mesquite Smokie Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 11:50 am
@tornado12,
Actually no. All he did was get in the way of the shot and not get his stick on it. It went off his shoulder and back out.
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tornado12 Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 12:20 pm
@Mesquite Smokie, earlier when the penalty happened (against chara i believe) the puck was in the slot and quick sticked it to the far side, bos recovered and never gave up the puck after that on the play. i guess the penalty was simultaneous? i reviewed it and felt the penalty was before but maybe not. oh well, no use crying over spilled milk.
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Dustin Brown had a season low of zero hits this game.
Brown has recorded a single hit or less since the Islanders game.
Interesting.
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Tmik Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 12:13 pm
@Token, Yeah, He’s usually leads the league in hits, but this year, he’s putting up a few numbers instead.
I think he’s tied or really close to Team lead in goals.
I’ll take the tradeoff.
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“0-for-5 on the power play” When is Jamie Kompon going to change whatever he is doing or for that matter not doing about the PP. The kings could have really used a PP goal last night and will need PP goals in the playoffs.
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Despite the negative numbers above, there were some poitives:
- We beat a quality team
- We beat a quality team with the (then) hottest goalie in the NHL
- We beat a quality team with the (then) hottest goalie in the NHL in their home rink
- We beat a quality team with the (then) hottest goalie in the NHL in their home rink on the back end of a back-to-back
- We got 2 points
- Despite the Bruins staging a big comeback, our team didn’t fold and fought till the end
-After Quick’s performance last night, I don’t think anyone is going to want to go into the shootout with us
The goal is to win and the team did that. There is of course room to improve, but the team has shown that they have the ability to win in even adverse situations.
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DesertKing Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 12:15 pm
@DesertKing,
Sorry, it should read “positives”
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mcsorleyfan Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 12:32 pm
@DesertKing, I’ll take poitives when they look like this!
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What's the frequency, Kenneth? Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 4:41 pm
@mcsorleyfan, I see a partridge in a pear tree in the near future.
rontheking Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 12:39 pm
@DesertKing,
here here!
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Dan SanDonkey Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 4:45 pm
@DesertKing,
I agree with all the positives and I’m not trying to come off as a D-bag. I see everything this team is capable of achiving and it worries me that the PP is holding them back.
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Bottom line:
Fire kampon. Get back to a resemblance of a power play.
Trade for a LW or at the very least put Simmer on the 1st line when poni comes back.
If you are trying to be a puck possession team and you cannot win face-offs then you need to make a serious adjustment on working to improve in that category.
These are serious deficiencies. This isn’t being ticky tack. These are serious wraknessness that are currently causing problems and will HAVE to be rectified if this team is going to contend. This question remains, how soon will DL and the coaching staff take action?
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puck73 Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 2:03 pm
@Kings x, I think putting Simmonds on the 1st line for now is a pretty good idea to at least try temporarily for now as I have suggested as such previously. As far as Kompon goes, I stated it last night and I will say it again, either he learns to make in-game adjustments or he should either be relieved of this responsibility or terminated.
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Kevin Westgarth has a point! Will people now PUH-LEASE get off his back for not scoring?!? Geez!
On a serious note, Quick is the man! In the shootout, he just looked poised and in control. I got home late and watched the shootout on DVR at 2 in the morning and I went nuts! I started saying in the third round of the shootout that Zeus should be in there. I was screaming at the TV to put him in (yes, I know the game had finished some 7 hours before, but my yelling still makes a difference, ya know?).
Great to get those two points. Here’s hoping this is the start of a new win streak!
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puck73 Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 2:08 pm
@KingsFan in OC, Agree on Quick. When you consider that he was on the road and he was facing the goalie with the best stats in league currently, and the glare of the spotlight was on both of them, the Bruins didnt even come close ! Jon Quick embraced the spotlight in the shootout and refused to let the team lose. Also, Quick was money in the 1st and 3rd periods when the Kings needed him the most ! If this team would score 1 or 2 PP goals a game then……well, I think thats been covered.
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KC23 Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 9:26 pm
@puck73, You see that crap preview on the Sens game? The writer for nhl.com compleletly took TM’s comments out of context.
He made it sound like TM was re-thinking his goalie rotation because of Quick’s inconsistency … of which there hasn’t been, (instead of Bernier, which is what TM obviously meant). Wonder if this Eric Goodman just messed up or giving Thomas a little push towards the Vezina by pushing Quick away from it?
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Section 103 Fan Reply:
November 22nd, 2010 at 8:01 am
@KingsFan in OC,
What we all eat, wear, do before and while watching a game on DVR makes the difference. Glad to hear someone is as superstitious as me.
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Did doughty put on some extra pounds in the offseason?
I might catch alot of **** for this, but Doughty has looked slow and out of shape this season. It’s not the Doughty we have seen play in seasons past. He seems to get beat easily and out of position a lot.
I don’t know, maybe I expect too much from him.
Anyone else have thoughts on this?
I feel so far this hasn’t been a great year for Doughty.
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Dan SanDonkey Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 4:48 pm
@kylecliffordfan,
I think DD is going through a normal “sophomore slump” a year late. Even in a slump he plays better that 95% of the D men in the NHL.
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Hockeysureshot Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 6:50 pm
@kylecliffordfan, I have been wondering the same thing lately. He just doesn’t look the same. Maybe the injury is still taking it’s toll.
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Our PP is gargabe. We need a change right now! Not later. Imagine if we actually had a decent PP? We would be on the top of the league the whole season.
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Rich – Did you hear anything about the linesman who got struck with the puck? Was he OK?
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I was at the game last night, so I don’t know if the TV showed the linesman being helped up and off the ice or not. That guy looked like he had no idea where he was or what he was supposed to be doing. He was very unsteady on his skates leaving the ice and he had a couple of guys helping him too. Hope he’s ok though.
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KC23 Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 9:28 pm
@Simarosa, Yeah, we got a good look on TV. The poor guy looked like he had no idea what happened or where he was as he left the ice.
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