Will tonight be the night?

The Kings will clinch at least eighth place in the Western Conference if they beat the Sharks tonight. The Kings get a chance to earn it themselves. Anaheim could have handed a playoff spot to the Kings last night, but the Ducks lost to the Dallas Stars in regulation, and that kept the Kings’ “magic number” at two. Terry Murray seemed unmoved about the Stars’ win last night and said his focus was on the Kings’ ability to win games, going forward.

MURRAY: “I think you always have to look at games that way. You want to take care of your own business and do your thing the right way. I caught some of the highlights of that game last night with Dallas and Anaheim. A pretty interesting finish. I’ll tell you what, it was a great call by the official. With the pressure of the moment and how quick that play developed, to be able to recognize it and wave it off immediately, that was a quality refereeing job.”

Murray was referring to the fact that Anaheim had two goals disallowed in the final minutes last night, due to a goalie-interference call and a hand-pass call. Incidentally, both calls were made by referee Brad Meier, who will be one of the referees in San Jose tonight. Murray said he didn’t attach any particular significance to a team winning its way into the playoffs, rather than being handed a spot because of another team’s loss.

MURRAY: “I really don’t look at it that way. I just feel, as a team, that you’ve got to keep playing the games the right way, playing hard and trying to put as many points on the board as you possibly can. And even if you do have a position clinched, my philosophy is that I’m not going to back off on how I’m going to use the players. I’m not going to take anybody out of the lineup to rest them. If you do anything at all, you might just back off a few minutes, in minutes played over the course of the game. When you get to this late in the year, I think you would like to just keep going. You’ve got to keep your attitude, your focus and play as if you are getting ready for the playoffs, which would start in a couple days.”