Kings want to avoid `pajama party’

Perhaps, tomorrow morning, Darryl Sutter will blindfold his players, feed them a steak dinner and try to convince them it’s nighttime. The Kings and St. Louis Blues have a noon start time for Game 4 tomorrow at Staples Center, and afternoon games haven’t been the kindest to the Kings. In the regular season, they played four games that started either at 12:30 p.m. or 1 p.m. local time, and they went 0-3-1. Whether that’s a coincidence or not, the Kings will try to break that trend tomorrow. Dustin Brown and Justin Williams said they don’t consider the early start to be a factor.

BROWN: “No. We’ve played noon games, and you guys have all the stats with our noon games. All I have to say is, this isn’t game 43.’’

WILLIAMS: “I’m fine with the noon game. I think everyone here is, too. We’ve had so much time between games here that we kind of want to get them going. So, having an earlier game is probably nice for us.’’

Darryl Sutter, asked about the early start time, shrugged and told the media about his sleepwear.

SUTTER: “I just fold my pajamas, and that’s it.’’

It was suggested that perhaps Sutter’s midseason arrival might break the Kings out of the presumed afternoon funk, but the stats don’t really bear that out. Under Sutter, the Kings lost an afternoon home game to Columbus and an afternoon road game (in overtime) to the New York Islanders.

SUTTER: “We played an afternoon game and lost 1-0 Columbus or somebody. It was a pajama party. I don’t think it had anything to do with me coming here. … I will tell you tell you this. How many people are standing here? Three, six, eight, 10, let’s say 20 of us. Some of you guys are morning people and some of you are not. That’s a fact. The 25 (players), are they all morning people? Or are they night people? That’s a fact. You can’t change that. I don’t think I can change that.’’