January 27 practice notes

Forward lines at this morning’s practiced, grouped together by color coded jerseys:

Yellow: Gaborik – Kopitar – Brown
Black: King – Carter – Toffoli
White: Clifford – Stoll – Williams – Nolan
Green: Andreoff – Shore – Lewis

Notes:

-The Kings were breaking in their Legends Night gear, hence the Forum Blue and gold jersey hues. Barry Melrose will be honored at the first Legends Night, which takes place when Calgary visits on February 12. As noted previously, Los Angeles will wear gold jerseys for Legends Nights this year.

-Tyler Toffoli continues to progress. There’s a decent chance he’ll play tomorrow, though that’s a decision that will ultimately be made by himself and Darryl Sutter. A good sign: Toffoli took part in more battle drills today. “I’m just trying to push myself more than I usually would the day before a game,” he said. “Just trying to get my legs under me, it’s been a long couple weeks here, and I’m just excited, and if I’m going, I’m going to try and play my best.”

-Darryl Sutter said that the team is operating under the thought that Tanner Pearson might not be back in time for the playoffs, should the team qualify. “Basically, after the injury, we just looked at it like he was done for the year,” Sutter said. Obviously this isn’t a change in Pearson’s status or any type of re-evaluation; it’s the simple acknowledgement that broken bones take a long time to heal, and even though there’s a general three-month recovery period that has been shared, there’s still rehabilitation and strengthening that could potentially add time to his expected absence.

-I wrote a story about Chris Sutter’s summer work at a butcher in Viking, Alberta. It’s called Coach Chris. Click here for the link.

-More stories are coming today on Toffoli, Jonathan Quick, Jeff Carter and how the team is preparing for the post-All Star break schedule. Stay tuned!