March 3 morning skate notes

Good afternoon from the team hotel. Let’s get down to it. Lines shown at today’s morning skate indicated no changes from those used at yesterday’s practice:

Gaborik – Kopitar – Lewis
King – Carter – Toffoli
Brown – Stoll – Williams
Clifford – Shore – Andreoff – Nolan

Regehr – Doughty
McNabb – Sekera
Muzzin – Greene
McBain

Notes:

-Jonathan Quick left the ice first, so he’s expected to start in net. Andy Andreoff and Jamie McBain remained on the ice for extra work, so they’re not likely to play against the Oilers tonight (6:30 p.m. PT / FOX Sports West).

-Drew Doughty, on why the Kings have raised their level of play late in the season and the playoffs:

-I’ll have a story on it later today, but there is hope that Alec Martinez could resume skating at some point later this week. He has missed 10 games since suffering “concussion-like symptoms” on a hit from Cedric Paquette in Los Angeles’ 4-2 win at Tampa Bay on February 7. In addition to the Martinez report, I’ll also have another post on the Kings’ approach to the trading deadline, and what the team viewed as its most striking need (hint: it was defense).

-Radio hits: I’ll join Bob Stauffer on Oilers Now at 12:35 p.m. PT on CHED 630. Click here to listen in. For those with Sirius XM, I’ll join Scott Laughlin and Matthew Barnaby at 2:00 p.m. PT to preview tonight’s tilt.

-Ben Scrivens will start in net for Edmonton tonight. Lisa Dillman, Mark Spector, Jack Michaels and I had a good chat with The Professor earlier today. Topics included: social media/internet commenting, mental health awareness and journalistic ethics, amongst hockey-related topics. There’s no story coming; I just thought you should all know about our interesting conversation.

-Oilers defenseman Justin Schultz, on what Jeff Petry meant to the team:

Lots more to come…