Game 17 Preview: Anaheim at Los Angeles

This is the second of four meetings between Los Angeles and Anaheim this season. On February 2, the Ducks defeated the Kings 7-4 at Honda Center. After tonight, the two teams will meet on Sunday, April 7 at Honda Center and Saturday, April 13 at Staples Center.

Los Angeles has won five of six games, holding opponents to one goal in the five wins. Anaheim has won six straight games – trailing in all six – and will attempt to equal the franchise’s longest winning streak, set from February 20 to March 7, 1999. Only the Boston Bruins – who have played 15 games – have appeared in as few games as the Kings and Ducks this season. Anaheim has allowed the game’s first goal in 11 of 16 games.

The Ducks are expected to start Viktor Fasth in net. The 30-year-old rookie who spent the previous two seasons with Stockholm-based Elitserien club AIK has never faced Los Angeles in his career. Overall, Fasth is 8-0-0 with a 1.78 goals against average and .933 save percentage. He is 5-0-0 on the road with a 2.04 GAA and .928 Sv%. In his last appearance, he stopped 32 of 34 shots through overtime and two of three shots in the shootout as Anaheim concluded a 5-1-0 road trip with a 3-2 shootout win at Nashville.

The Ducks are playing the second game of a back-to-back set and of a five-games-in-seven nights portion of the schedule. Last night they defeated Colorado 4-3 in overtime on Corey Perry’s power play game-winner with 46 seconds remaining in the extra session.

Jonathan Quick is expected to get the start for the Kings. He is 11-5-2 with a 2.52 GAA and .904 Sv% lifetime against Anaheim and was pulled in the February 2 meeting between the teams after six minutes, having allowed two goals on three shots. He is 2-1-1 with a 2.17 GAA and .892 Sv% at home this season.

Rankings and Statistics:
Goals/Game: LAK – 21 / 2.44; ANA – 3 / 3.31
Goals Against/Game: LAK – 8 / 2.38; ANA – 14 / 2.56
Power Play: LAK – 26 / 14.1%; ANA – 4 / 26.9%
Penalty Kill: LAK – 18 / 81.4%; ANA – 28 / 74.6%
Shots/Game: LAK – 9 / 29.8; ANA – 25 / 27.6
Shots Against/Game: LAK – 2 / 24.9; ANA – t-9 / 27.9
Faceoffs: LAK – t-13 / 50.5%; ANA – 23 / 48.6%

Projected Lines – Los Angeles

Dustin Brown – Anze Kopitar – Justin Williams
Trevor Lewis – Mike Richards – Jeff Carter
Dustin Penner – Jarret Stoll – Dwight King
Kyle Clifford – Colin Fraser – Jordan Nolan

Keaton Ellerby – Drew Doughty
Rob Scuderi – Slava Voynov
Jake Muzzin – Davis Drewiske

Jonathan Quick
Jonathan Bernier

Notes: Keaton Ellerby and Jake Muzzin have rotated alongside Drew Doughty over the previous three games. Rob Scuderi is a plus-6 over his last three games.

Projected Lines – Anaheim

Matt Beleskey – Ryan Getzlaf – Corey Perry
Bobby Ryan – Nick Bonino – Teemu Selanne
Andrew Cogliano – Saku Koivu –Daniel Winnik
Patrick Maroon – Peter Holland – Kyle Palmieri

Sheldon Souray – Francois Beauchemin
Bryan Allen – Cam Fowler
Luca Sbisa – Toni Lydman

Viktor Fasth
Jonas Hiller

Notes: Toni Lydman, who did not play in last night’s win over Colorado, is likely to play. Head Coach Bruce Boudreau is mindful of playing Lydman on back to back nights, meaning last night’s scratch indicates he’ll be in the lineup tonight. If he doesn’t go, Ben Lovejoy would draw back into the lineup. Francois Beauchemin recorded four assists last night and is a plus-13 in February. His plus-15 rating leads the league. Sheldon Souray ranks second in the NHL with a plus-13 rating.

Rules for Blog Commenting

  • No profanity, slurs or other offensive language. Replacing letters with symbols does not turn expletives into non-expletives.
  • Personal attacks against other blog commenters, and/or blatant attempts to antagonize other comments, are not tolerated. Respectful disagreement is encouraged. Posts that continually express the same singular opinion will be deleted.
  • Comments that incite political, religious or similar debates will be deleted.
  • Please do not discuss, or post links to websites that illegally stream NHL games.
  • Posting under multiple user names is not allowed. Do not type in all caps. All violations are subject to comment deletion and/or banning of commenters, per the discretion of the blog administrator.

Repeated violations of the blog rules will result in site bans, commensurate with the nature and number of offenses.

Please flag any comments that violate the site rules for moderation. For immediate problems regarding problematic posts, please email zdooley@lakings.com.