4/28 Preview – Rittich To Start, Hiller Speaks on Decision + Today’s Line Rushes & 5-on-5 Is The Play

WHO: Los Angeles Kings (1-2) vs. Edmonton Oilers (2-1)
WHAT: Stanley Cup Playoffs – Round 1, Game 4
WHEN: Sunday, April 28 @ 7:30 PM Pacific
WHERE: Crypto.com Arena – Los Angeles, CA
HOW TO FOLLOW: VIDEO: Bally Sports West / TBS – AUDIO – iHeart Radio – TWITTER: @DooleyLAK & @LAKings

TONIGHT’S MATCHUP: The Kings are in search of a series split, with Game 4 on the docket on home ice.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: Forward Quinton Byfield and defenseman Drew Doughty enter tonight’s action on concurrent five-game playoff point streaks, tied for the fourth longest active streaks in the postseason. Byfield has four assists from three games played in this series, tied for the eight most in the playoffs, and his +5 rating leads all skaters around the NHL.

KINGS VITALS: The Kings opted not to practice on the day in between games and returned to the ice for a full-team morning skate here today.

Goaltender David Rittich will get the start tonight for the hosts, his first playoff start as a member of the LA Kings. Rittich has played just twice in the playoffs throughout his career. This season with the Kings, Rittich posted a record of 13-6-3, with a .921 save percentage and a 2.15 goals-against average.

Here’s how the Kings aligned this morning in El Segundo –

Byfield – Kopitar – Kempe
Moore – Danault – Arvidsson
Fiala – Lizotte – Lewis
Grundstrom – Dubois – Laferriere
Kaliyev

Anderson – Doughty
Gavrikov – Roy
Englund – Spence
Moverare

Rittich / Talbot / Dell

As shown above, a couple of tweaks to the line rushes this morning. The Kings have switched things up in-game, over the first three games, with players rotating in and out, up and down the lineup at times. Looks like the same combination of 18 players tonight, but we’ll see how they are utilized. Hiller has defenseman Jacob Moverare and forward Arthur Kailyev at his disposal, should he opt for a change, but looks to be the same collection of 18 forwards for tonight.

OILERS VITALS: Like the Kings, Edmonton also did not practice yesterday, opting for a team day off in advance of Game 4.

Coming off his strongest game of the series, as he made 27 saves on 28 shots against, look for goaltender Stuart Skinner to get the start in net tonight for the visitors. Skinner has a record of 2-1-0 thus far in the series, with a .890 save percentage and a 3.31 goals-against average.

Per Edmonton radio broadcaster Bob Stauffer, here’s how the Oilers lined up during their morning skate today at Crypto.com Arena –

The @EdmontonOilers morning skate:

Henrique-McDavid-Hyman
RNH-Draisaitl-Kane
Foegele-McLeod-Perry
Holloway-Ryan-Janmark
Gagner-Carrick-Brown

Ekholm-Bouchard
Nurse-Ceci
Kulak-Desharnais
Stecher

Skinner
Pickard

— Bob Stauffer (@Bob_Stauffer) April 28, 2024

The visitors are expected to make one lineup change, with forward Derek Ryan checking in for his series debut. Edmonton saw five players collect multiple points in Game 4, led by three points apiece from Leon Draisaitl (2-1-3), Connor McDavid (1-2-3) and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (0-3-3). Evander Kane also had a multi-point night with a goal and an assist, his first points of the series, as he picked up a Gordie Howe Hat Trick in Game 3.

Notes –
Big Save Dave
There will be one lineup change tonight for the LA Kings, with goaltender David Rittich stepping in between the pipes for Game 4, as confirmed by Jim Hiller this morning.

“David is going to go and we feel good about that,” Hiller said today. “I thought Cam did a good job, that’s not it, but David has played really well for us and he’ll be good to go.”

The change comes after the Kings allowed 17 total goals over the first three games of the series. Hiller didn’t pin all that many of those goals on Talbot and if you watched the three games, I think that’s fair. He didn’t refer to the decision to make the change as a wakeup call for the group either, he shut that narrative down quickly, but simply the decision the team made on the day in between games.

Hiller noted that the Kings spoke to both goaltenders yesterday to inform them of the decision, which gives Rittich time to prepare.

“He’s had some time in between starts over the last six weeks, he’s come in from the bullpen, so that part I’m not concerned about at all,” Hiller said. “We brought the goalies in yesterday, we had the conversation, we let them know and away we go today.”

If you look at the season Rittich has had to date, he’s shown an ability to come in after long stretches out of the net and deliver.

Rittich’s last start game on April 13, which was right around two weeks ago.

As Hiller has said, Rittich has proven to be a guy who is able to come in after long stretches of not playing and find success. Five times this season Rittich has started with more than a week in between starts coming in. In those five games, he’s posted a record of 4-1-0, with a .953 save percentage and a 1.61 goals-against average. Two of the five games were shutout wins, including one against the Oilers on home ice. If there’s one thing you can say, it’s that Rittich has handled that element of this situation before and he’s handled it excellently.

“He’s played very well and the important part of it is he’s played well after he’s had to sit for a little bit,” Hiller added. “He’s come in and he just does his job.”

It’s Big Save Dave time in Los Angeles. See how it goes tonight.

Let’s Play Even Strength, Eh?
The Edmonton Oilers have scored 10 goals at even strength through the first three games of this series. The LA Kings have also scored 10 goals at even strength through the first three games of this series.

Power-play prowess in one direction, and not yet in the other, has been well documented. 5-on-5 scoring, less so.

It hasn’t been identical, but the script from the 2022 series has been followed a bit to this point. Through three games, Edmonton won twice in lopsided fashion, with the Kings winning a tightly-contested game. Edmonton handily led the way in terms of power-play goals in that series, but the Kings trailed only narrowly in 5-on-5 scoring and were even through five games. In their lone win from the first three games in 2022, a 4-3 triumph in Game 1, all four goals came at even strength. In their Game 2 victory on Wednesday, all five goals were 5-on-5 tallies.

The moral of the story is playing 5-on-5, and playing it the way the Kings want to play it, is the blueprint for success.

The Oilers are formidable at even-strength as well, but the Kings have matched them in that area thus far in the series.

“We took a bad penalty early and I know they didn’t score, but it gets you on your heels right away, it gets the crowd out of the game,” Head Coach Jim Hiller said of Game 3. “That’s not something we can afford to do. Not that it was the difference in the game, but we didn’t come back from it. We can’t shoot ourselves in the foot in any area of the game.”

That quote shows the fine line for the Kings in this series.

They’re a team built on depth, a team built on being able to get production from throughout the lineup, a team built on wearing you down at 5-on-5 with stingy defensive play and being a nightmare to matchup against when everyone is going. That hasn’t been the case in this series, but all of those things came together in Game 2. The Kings need to have those areas all clicking to be able to win. We’ve seen how dominant a team they can be when they do click. We’ve seen what happens when they don’t. That’s the focus heading into Game 4. Time to click.

“I think we’ve liked the way we are 5-on-5,” defenseman Mikey Anderson said this morning. “We’ve got forwards that can produce, whether it’s off the rush, down low in a ground game, they can do it all, play physical, but I think everyone believes in the group. At 5-on-5, I think it’s good for us, we’ve got to do our part trying to stay out of the box.”

Not only is it important for those areas at 5-on-5 to be present, but they have to be present from the start of the game.

Hiller spoke about how a penalty early can take the building out of the game, and it did somewhat, but so can a goal against. The Kings trailed 2-0 after 20 minutes in Game 1, and 4-0 before they scored their first goal in Edmonton. They trailed 3-0 after one period in Game 3. In Game 2, they came out of the gates soaring, as they scored the game’s first two goals and never trailed throughout the night.

In speaking with defenseman Drew Doughty this morning, he took a lot of the onus on himself for the start on Friday. He spoke about his turnover on the first Edmonton goal as being a deflating moment for the group.

“I thought actually the first couple of shifts were good and then I think once I made that turnover, when me and Mooresie weren’t on the same page, I felt like it deflated us,” Doughty said. “We can’t have times in a game where if a bad play is made or something like that, we can’t go go down. We’ve got to stay even and even try and raise above it when a mistake happens. I think that’s maybe what happened, after that turnover, was the team kind of just dropped down a little bit and so I guess that’s on me a little bit to not let that happen first off and then to bring them back and get the boys going again.”

While Doughty did what leaders do, it’s not just about one turnover or one play.

Everyone knows the start and the first period has to be better tonight. The Kings don’t believe that conceding the first goal forces them to change the way they play, but giving up the first goal is one thing and conceding three goals in the first period is another. If it’s a first period dominated by the Oilers, played the way the Oilers want to play, the hill back will be that much taller. The Kings believe they’ll come out hard after a disappointing night on Friday.

“That was just not good start from us, I feel we weren’t ready to play, they came up more hungry than us,” forward Quinton Byfield added this morning. “It was like us in Game 2. After a loss come out a little harder, more intense and that’s what they did and we have to be ready [tonight].”

Game 4 tonight, with a 7:30 PM (sort of) puck drop in Los Angeles. We’ll learn a lot about the makeup of this team tonight. 2-2 heading back to Edmonton is a place they’d have taken entering the series. 3-1 down is not. An opportunity there for the taking, tonight on home ice.