FINAL – Kings 4, Anaheim 1 – Rittich, Kempe, Edmundson, Hiller

The LA Kings won their first divisional game of the season as they defeated the Anaheim Ducks by a 4-1 final at Honda Center.

The first 40 minutes tonight went by without a goal, with both teams going 0-for-2 on the power play in the process.

Early in the third period, the Kings broke the deadlock through forward Adrian Kempe, who scored his third goal of the season. Forward Anze Kopitar sprung Kempe in behind the defense with a bank pass off the board from distance, directly to a charging Kempe. Kempe moved in on a breakaway and shot through the legs of Anaheim netminder Lukas Dostal for the go-ahead goal and a 1-0 advantage.

The Kings doubled their lead midway through the third period as forward Alex Laferriere got on the board for the second consecutive game. With the Kings on the forecheck, Laferriere intercepted an errant pass in the defensive zone, worked the puck onto his forehand and beat Dostal clean on the blocker side for his team-leading fourth goal of the season, putting the Kings ahead 2-0 in the process.

With inside two minutes to play in regulation, Anaheim got on the board through forward Ryan Strome, to bring the Ducks back to within a goal. Strome worked his way to the net and got his stick on a centering feed from forward Troy Terry, deflecting the puck past Kings netminder David Rittich to end his shutout bid 1:48 from the final buzzer.

The Kings ended the game with a pair of empty-net goals, coming from forward Kevin Fiala and defenseman Mikey Anderson, to seal the game with a 4-1 victory.

Hear from Rittich, Kempe, defenseman Joel Edmundson and Head Coach Jim Hiller following tonight’s victory in Anaheim.

David Rittich
On the team’s performance tonight and hanging in to get the win
It was good. I think we showed we can be patient. I think we maybe missed that kind of play last year, where we couldn’t stick with it and we just were pushing way too hard, and we gave up a lot, compared to this year, we were pushing but smart.

On the team’s penalty-killing performance in tonight’s win
Yeah, obviously we’ve been talking about it a lot, because we gave up a couple which we didn’t like. I think we didn’t have to change a lot of things, but we had to be smarter than we’ve been at the beginning and I think we paid the price.

On staying focused with a low shot volume to make timely saves when needed
I’ve been playing hockey for a long time, so I’ve had to have those games, especially last year and even in preseason. You’ve just got to keep fighting, got to stay in the present and go puck by puck.

Adrian Kempe
On his goal tonight and expecting passes like that from Anze Kopitar
Yeah. I mean, Kopi always makes great plays, him and Q. I kind of felt that I had the d-man beat, [it was] obviously a great pass by Kopi and I just try to, whenever I get one of those chances, I don’t need that many. It was a good finish.

On getting some support from the fans in Anaheim, on a long roadtrip
It’s nice. It was kind of a good feeling coming here, we usually have great fans coming here to Anaheim as well, so it was good feeling seeing Kings fans out there. That was nice. One more game here before we get to play at home.

On if he approaches this game any differently, considering his success here
It gives me a little confidence, I’ve known that I’ve played good here and against Anaheim, so I’ll keep that in the back of my head. Tonight, I don’t think I had my best game, but like I said, a couple chances and usually I can put a couple or one in the back of the net here. I’m not super happy with my game overall, but happy that I could get on the board and contribute for the team.

Joel Edmundson
On the team’s patience throughout the game
Yeah, I think just staying patient, I think our veteran leadership, having a bunch of guys that have been in the league for years, it paid off. I mean, we just stuck with our game. We knew we had to get a greasy goal, one of our guys is going to step up and Juice had a breakaway and buried one. That gave us life and we just stuck with it.

On the performance of David Rittich tonight to help secure the two points
He’s been great. He’s one of the guys that’s the life of the dressing room, so we’ll do anything for him. He was good at playing the puck tonight, he made the saves he needed to and he definitely helped us get the win.

On the team’s penalty-killing performance
We’ve been taking too many penalties the past few games, so we tried not to take that many, but in the first period, I think they had a couple and yeah, it’s big. It gives us life and they have a lot of skill on that side, so whenever they get more touches, they feel the puck more, they feel better about their game. Whenever you can kill their power play, it’s great.

Jim Hiller

Notes –
• Forward Adrian Kempe (1-0=1) scored his third goal of the season. The winger has now recorded 20 points (9-11=20) in his last 13 games against the Anaheim Ducks, dating back to May 21st, 2021.
• Second-year winger Alex Laferriere (1-0=1) registered his fourth goal of the season, marking the first time in his career that he has scored back-to-back game-winning goals.
• Forward Kevin Fiala (1-0=1) recorded his seventh goal in as many Freeway Faceoff appearances, and now has 10 points (7-3=10) in seven games against the Kings’ Pacific Division rivals since joining the team ahead of the 2022-23 season.
• Defenseman Mikey Anderson (1-1=2) registered his second goal and second assist of the season. With his goal, Anderson became the third Kings defenseman since 2019-20 toscore in consecutive games, following Drew Doughty (7x) and Sean Walker (2019-20), per NHL PR.
• Forward Phillip Danault (0-1=1) picked up his second helper of the campaign.
• Forward Anze Kopitar (0-1=1) provided the primary assist on Kempe’s opening tally and has now recorded 1,219 points in his career (422-797=1,219), tied with Jean Beliveau (507-712=1,219) for 45th in NHL history.
• Kopitar now sits three assists away from reaching the 800-assist plateau.
• Defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov (0-1=1) collected his third assist of the season, establishing an assist streak of two- games or longer for the tenth time in his career and the first time as a member of the Kings.
• Forward Alex Turcotte (0-1=1) registered an assist to further extend his career-long point streak to a fourth game (1- 3=4).
• Goaltender David Rittich turned aside 14 of the Ducks’ 15 shots on goal at Honda Center as the Kings played their first Western Conference opponent of the regular season.