One Quarter Overview – 3 Up, 3 Down for the Kings through 20 games

We’re 20 games into the 2024-25 season and the Los Angeles Kings sit at 10-7-3. They’ve played 20, they’ve won half, earning points in three of their ten defeats.

You could break down those 20 games in one of two buckets. By travel, the Kings have had a grueling go of it. Jim Hiller called it perhaps the most difficult six-week stretch he’s encountered to begin a season, with the Kings on the road from October 1 through October 18, rarely catching up along the way. Even with seven straight on the road, seven of the team’s next 13 were also on the road and they were broken up into five separate trips, four of which were flights. That’s a really difficult start and the Kings came out of it in a playoff position.

If you want to look at it from the other direction, though, per Tankathon, the Kings have had the NHL’s easiest strength of schedule to date, looking at the opposition they’ve played. Keep in mind this is completely driven by their model, not by actual numbers, but the Kings have, by this model, had the league’s easiest draw of opponents to this point. By actual winning percentage, the Kings have faced an average of a .505 winning percentage. Over half, but barely. That’s around a 83-point team, which isn’t a playoff team. In total, looking at today’s standings, the Kings have played nine of 20 games against teams currently in or tied for a playoff spot, compared to 11 against teams outside of playoff positioning.

Depending on which side you want to argue, either argument is factual and fair. The Kings have faced one of the league’s most difficult starts in terms of travel and home/road split. They’ve had one of the league’s easiest starts in terms of opposition. The home/road distribution doesn’t really start to even out until February. The opposition in December, though, becomes more difficult, with December’s schedule currently consisting of a .564 winning percentage, which is, on average, close to a wild card team.

When you factor both together, 10-7-3 is probably fair, considering the way the Kings have played overall. Games against Vegas and Minnesota saw the Kings outplay teams that are at the top of the standings. Wins over Detroit, Montreal and Nashville were convincing performances against teams lower in the standings. The loss in San Jose was a clear step back, as were a few others along the way.

A look at three key areas, in each direction, from the first 20 games.

3 Up
Team Defense
When Drew Doughty went down, I had concerns.

The team was transitioning to a system that was designed to improve the team’s offensive output. The 1-3-1 had its flaws, but defensive structure was not one of them. The 1-2-2, as the Kings play it, is still designed to be a strong, defensive system, but offering more freedom to transition. Fair to ask if there would be breakdowns early, as the team adjusted.

When Doughty got injured in the preseason, an added wrinkle of playing without their best defenseman was thrown into the mix. With Matt Roy departing for Washington over the summer, that was RD1 and RD2 from last season’s team not in the lineup. The response through 20 games? Excellent.

One of six teams in the NHL giving up fewer than 2 goals per game, 5-on-5, on a per/60 basis. If you look at expected goals against, which is an accumulation of the chances surrendered, the Kings rank second in the NHL. The Kings are among the league’s best in terms of suppressing dangerous chances, blocking more than one third of all shot attempts in the process.

Team defense is exactly that. Team. It’s been the strongest area the Kings have had as a unit and they’ve overcome a lot to get there. More below on another strength in the early goings, which focus on the defensemen themselves.

Defensemen Elevating Their Game
Until he played the right side in Montreal, I had no idea that Vladislav Gavrikov was a right-sided defenseman for the bulk of his junior career. Said he’s equally comfortable playing on his offhand and he’s certainly looked the part.

With Doughty out, Gavrikov is the team’s highest-paid defenseman. The Kings needed him, along with Mikey Anderson, to really step up and keep the ship sailing in Doughty’s absence. With more minutes, playing against the opposition’s best players, how has Gavrikov responded? With the best defensive numbers of his NHL career.

In the best way, Gavrikov’s numbers are down across the board. With number 84 on the ice, the Kings are allowing very little, with Gavrikov’s goals against, expected goals against and high-danger chances against all at the lowest levels of his NHL career. Along the way, he’s been matched step-by-step by Anderson, who has been his most regular partner at 5-on-5.

Anderson is also posting stellar splits. His 1.38 goals against per/60 leads all Kings defensemen and among the 103 defensemen with at least 300 minutes played at 5-on-5, Anderson ranks tied for fourth in the NHL in that category. Like Gavrikov, Anderson has delivered while logging the team’s most difficult minutes, along with heavy work on the penalty kill. Though both players are certainly known for their defensive attributes, Anderson is tracking towards 30 points, while Gavrikov is pacing closer to 35, both paces being higher than their career bests. 20 games isn’t 82, but if both players can maintain their level of play when Doughty comes back, it should allow the Kings to lessen the burden on their long-time number one, and hopefully elevate the play of the entire group, with three guys playing at a top-pairing level.

Younger Players Raising Their Levels
Who had forward Alex Laferriere leading the team in goals at the quarter point in the season?

Laferriere has nine goals, tied with forward Adrian Kempe for the team lead, while his 15 points are third on the team behind only Kempe and Anze Kopitar. Okay, you might’ve said that makes sense coming out of camp, because the expectation was that those three players would form a forward line. In Game 5, though, Laferriere was separated from Kopitar/Kempe and moved onto a line with Warren Foegele. Laferriere’s totals have generally remained steadfast. Unsustainable early shooting percentage aside, you can’t take away the goals he’s scored and they haven’t been cheap ones, either. Skill plays, good shots, high-IQ deflections, you name it, he’s scored it. One who has elevated his game this season to make up for a few others who haven’t started firing just yet.

On the blueline, Brandt Clarke has elevated his game in a similar way.

Last season, Clarke played games, but he was never really seen by the Kings as an everyday defenseman. Early this season, while usage has wavered towards the bottom of the defensive corps, Clarke’s has remained consistent, if not been elevated. In October, Clarke averaged 18:10 in time on ice. That’s up to 20:28 in November thus far, with his totals exceeding 20 minutes in six of the nine games the Kings have played, after cracking 20 minutes just twice in 11 games during October.

Clarke is a player with offensive gifts, and we’ve seen them on display in full force. His spinning pass to Kopitar for a tap-in goal is the play of the season. His defensive reads are improving too. It’s little things, but I’ve seen him in situations that were maybe 50/50 pucks, where earlier in the season he would’ve activated and maybe lost. Now he’s staying back. If it’s 80/20, you go and you take what comes with it. When it’s a coinflip, or worse? Clarke is learning and growing. If his progress continues to be linear, look out.

Would also like to add a mention of Alex Turcotte here, who has played the best hockey of his NHL career in the early stages of this season. While he’s missed time with injury, Turcotte has played well both at center and on the wing. He’s earned more minutes in doing so, moving from the fourth line into the top nine mix. The numbers are just okay (5 points from 15 games), but his play has risen to another level.

3 Down
Middle-Six Production
The Kings have gotten expected production from Anze Kopitar and Adrian Kempe at the top of the lineup, with Kopitar over a point-per-game and Kempe just under it.

Behind those players, though, the Kings have had a mixed bag at times.

Phillip Danault, Trevor Moore and Quinton Byfield have combined to score six goals through 20 games. Moore has gotten it going as of late, with points in eight straight games before Thursday’s shutout loss against Buffalo, and I think his play has been fairly consistent, especially as of late. Still, that trio combined to score 68 goals last season and it’s those guys who can elevate the team to another level. For Danault and Byfield, their underlying metrics are in line with past seasons, or in Danault’s case, his expected goals metric is actually higher. Moore’s are a bit down, but the three players together average out to nothing out of the ordinary from last season’s chances. So, there’s something to look at going forward, but the Kings do need more goals overall and all three can help provide them.

The Kings don’t have a Connor McDavid on their team. They have to win differently and the way they can do that is by having three lines producing at a top-six clip. The Carolina method. When everyone is going effectively, there’s more than enough offense to go around. Danault can lead a very effective middle-six line, he’s done it every season he’s been a King. It’s in there for Byfield too, even if the offensive totals haven’t been there so far this season. At the end of the day, though, the Kings simply need goals and they’ll need more in certain areas.

Additionally, while the goals have been there (7 from 19 games), it’s been a bit of a roller coaster for Kevin Fiala to start the season. The night in San Jose aside, the game he missed due to missing a team meeting, Fiala has had some dominant nights, but others where he’s fought the puck a bit. -6 doesn’t tell the whole story, but most Kings regulars are on the plus side of the ledger. Fiala is a high-level player and he started slow last season as well, before really finding his groove around this time. He is the team’s best playmaker too. A similar step forward, as he made last year, would huge for this team.

Power-Play Percentage
Seemed to come to a forefront on Wednesday evening.

In their post-game interviews, the Kings felt that they got the necessary chances against the Sabres. They simply did not finish them. I think there’s some truth there, but there were also situations where more of a shooting mentality was needed, that the Kings perhaps sought the perfect pass far too often.

Wednesday was the first game we saw multiple opportunities for a five forward approach. The Kings went 0-for-5 in total, dropping the unit below 15 percent on the season at 14.3, the fourth-lowest rate in the NHL. This coming next to a PK group that continues to improve.

Perhaps the changes need more time to gel. It’s a left shot at the top in Adrian Kempe for the first time in years, which creates different reads and different looks. The Kings felt that Kempe wasn’t getting enough touches at the right side of the umbrella, with teams looking to take that seam pass through the slot away. With Kempe at the top, it opens up one timers from the center point and makes Kempe more of a facilitator as well. The Kings rank slightly better when it comes to chances for in power-play situations, but they’re still in the bottom third of the NHL on a per/60 basis.

At the end of the day, the power play needs to not only score goals, but score goals in timely situations. Wednesday’s game was an example of a game in which one power-play goal would have been worth a point in the standings, if not two. I’m not sure if the five-forward approach is the answer or not, but I do like some of the things it should create on paper. The unit before that wasn’t getting the job done either. With a stretch of important games coming up to close out November, the Kings need that unit contributing its share.

Consistency
We’ve seen what this team can do when they execute their game to its fullest. We’ve seen what happens when it goes the other way, too.

The Kings haven’t won three straight games this season. They also haven’t lost three straight games in regulation, with the 0-1-2 mark in Games 2, 3 and 4 the longest losing streak they’ve faced to date.

I look at Detroit and Buffalo as a bit of a microcosm of that, even though the team was happier with the Buffalo game than I think most were. The Detroit game was dominance. The Buffalo game, though tightly contested, did not have the same types of things done in terms of forechecking and cleanly taken offensive opportunities. Look back to the end of October, too. The Kings laid an egg in San Jose, but came home the next night and throttled Vegas. The Vegas performance was one of the best of the season, against a high caliber opponent. The San Jose game was probably the worst showing of the year.

A little more Jekyll and a little less Hyde, perhaps.

That’s all for today, Insiders. A bigger picture focus. Game preview to come in the AM before the Kings host Seattle tomorrow afternoon!