Kings 2, Penguins 1 – Talbot, Kempe, Hiller

Adrian Kempe scored to tie the game with 6:11 remaining in the third period and then added the winning goal three minutes later to give the LA Kings a 2-1 victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins on Sunday night at PPG Paints Arena.

Kempe, who had previously scored five goals in the last two matchups against the Penguins, now has seven tallies against Pittsburgh in the last three head-to-head matchups between the clubs.

Cam Talbot made the start in between the pipes for the Kings, his first since late January, and picked up the win by stopping 29 of Pittsburgh’s 30 shots on goal.

Kempe’s tying strike was a long-range drive from the right point that deflected twice on its way into the net. Assists on the play were credited to both Drew Doughty and Viktor Arvidsson.

The winner, however, came shorthanded with seven seconds remaining on a minor penalty to Trevor Moore for delay of game. Anze Kopitar worked the puck out of the defensive zone to Kempe, who jumped into a 2-on-1 rush alongside defender Vladislav Gavrikov. Kempe elected to shoot the puck and beat goaltender Tristan Jarry with a low wrister for his 19th goal of the season.

The Penguins had previously taken a 1-0 lead late in the first period on a power play goal by Sidney Crosby that put Pittsburgh in front with 1:17 remaining on the clock. That play started with a faceoff win for the Penguins’ captain that began their second man-advantage of the night. Crosby then moved to the inside of the right circle for a one-timer feed from Erik Karlsson that he sent over the right shoulder of Talbot.

The Kings were outshot 12-10 in the first but controlled the opportunities more soundly in the second by a margin of 14-7 before a more even third where the Penguins had a 11-10 advantage. Overall, LA held a 33-30 edge in shots on goal during the contest.

Other standout offensive opportunities for the Kings in the game included breakaway looks for Quinton Byfield in the second period and Pierre-Luc Dubois in the third, but neither were able to convert on the look.

Pittsburgh had multiple tries to beat Talbot in the final moments of the third after pulling Jarry in exchange for an extra attacker but were unsuccessful. Jarry made 31 saves for the Penguins in a losing effort.

The Kings killed off four of Pittsburgh’s five power play chances and were unable to find the back of the net on any of their three opportunities.

Below, hear from Kempe on his two-goal night, as well as Talbot and interim head coach Jim Hiller, whose record since taking over as the team’s bench boss is now 4-1-0 in five contests.

Adrian Kempe

Cam Talbot
On the team’s resiliency and ability to come back and get a win in the third
The belief, I think that we can come back and win this game no matter what the score was going into the third period. We saw that resiliency yesterday, and we knew that even though we’re down going in the third period that we could pull another one out tonight and that’s what we were able to do.

On it being his first start since the break and him getting going
I’d say like the first couple, like power plays and stuff like that. They got some chances, got some shots, got me into the rhythm a little bit. Obviously gave up on there on the second power play, but settled in after that, and the guys made it pretty easy on me tonight, keeping them to the outside. I was able to control most of the shots and anything I did leave there the guys were really good at sweeping the crease for me tonight.

On playing after a big event like he did with Jaromir Jagr’s jersey retirement ceremony
You know there’s going to be the buzz. And then when they get that first one and it’s Sid and the crowd goes crazy and they show [Jagr] up and up in the press box and stuff like that, you know that the fans are going to be into it right away. I thought we did a good job of silencing them after that, we didn’t give them a whole lot to cheer for after and you know this is a tough building to play for and those fans are into it. Give our guys a ton of credit for taking their fans out of the game and coming out with a huge two points to end the road trip.

Jim Hiller
On the way his team competed in the game
Well, if I just run it back to the last nine periods, I thought every period was pretty much the same. There was a little bit of a change in momentum in some of the games with the penalties, tonight was the first period, we had two. But really, it was a blueprint for each period was pretty similar for myself. Pretty proud of the team for sure, because the last period looked like the first period of Jersey, which is when we really started getting ourselves going.

On the two goals scored by Adrian Kempe
Yeah, you know, it’s interesting. He’s a goal scorer and he got 40 last year. But we just asked the guys to recommit the mindset, recommit to our identity. The goals are going to come from different people at different times, for sure. But for me, it’s just the work ethic. Juice got back on the body, he’s physical if you look at the hit chart. So he’s doing all the right things to get back to the identity of the team and part of that comes, goal scorer. His first one took a couple bounces I think it wasn’t pretty, but once you get that one then the next one usually comes a little easier.

On the play of Cam Talbot, who got his first win coming out of the break
Cam was really good. He made the save when he had to make the save. But what I would say is our entire d-corps in front of him I thought played tremendous. Certainly the best game on the road trip. There wasn’t a lot of second shots so Cam was able to take the first one. We had sticks, we had bodies, we battled hard in front of him in that blue paint area and that made it easier for him. So he only had to make the first one.

On the commitment to the game plan from his team
That feels really good, for sure. I’m just happy for them because, we had a really hard six weeks or eight weeks, whatever you want to call it and it just doesn’t feel good. When your job isn’t going good for you it doesn’t feel good. There’s only one way to get out of that, to just dig yourself out of it. You need the guys beside you to do that as well. It takes each guy individually but collectively, one guy can’t let anybody down. I thought after the Buffalo game this trip, we had everybody on board. Everybody recommitted. There wasn’t a guy that we could point to that said didn’t do the job. That makes you tough to beat when you get that.

Notes –

– Adrian Kempe (2-0=2) recorded his third multi-goal game of the season, which included his 11th career shorthanded goal to pass Trevor Moore and Ziggy Palffy for the sixth-most in Kings history. Kempe now has seven goals (7-0=0) over his last three games against Pittsburgh.

– It also marked Kempe’s second multi-goal third period of the season. Per NHL PR, only Auston Matthews (3) has more.

– Kempe hit the 300-point mark of his career (150-150=300) in his 525th career game to become the 10th-fastest player to record 300 career points with the Kings after debuting with the club. Anze Kopitar is the only active skater to reach such feat faster (333 GP). Kempe is also the second Swedish-skater in franchise history to record 300 points, joining Juha Widing (131-211=332).

– Per NHL PR, Kempe is the 12th player in league history to have a 150 goal, 150 assist breakdown at the time of their 300th career point, and the first since Viktor Arvidsson (Nov. 16, 2022).

– Anze Kopitar (0-1=1) notched his 28th assist of the season, extending his point streak to a third game (2-1=3), and his point streak against the Penguins to a third game (0-5=5). Kopitar has now scored 10 points (2-8=10) over his last six games against Pittsburgh, dating back to Jan. 13, 2022.

– The assist marked the 776th of Kopitar’s career, tying Jean Ratelle for the 40th-most assists in NHL history. It was also the 12th shorthanded road point (5-7=12) of his career, tying Butch Goring (12-0=12) for the fourth-most in franchise history.

– Drew Doughty (0-1=1) picked up his 18th helper of the season, extending his road point streak against the Penguins into a fifth game (1-4=5).

– Viktor Arvidsson (0-1=1) registered his second assist in as many games.

– Cam Talbot stopped 29 of 30 shots faced to improve his record to 14-13-5 on the season.

The Kings will travel back to Los Angeles following tonight’s game. Tomorrow is a scheduled team off day, before the Kings return to the ice on Tuesday at 10:30 AM for morning skate, in advance of that evening’s game versus Columbus.

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