3/1 Preview – The Need For Power-Play Production + Foegele vs. Playoff Teams, Back-To-Backs

WHO: Los Angeles Kings (31-18-8) @ St. Louis Blues (28-26-6)
WHAT: 2024-25 Regular-Season Game
WHEN: Saturday, March 1 @ 5:00 PM Pacific
WHERE: Enterprise Center – St. Louis, MO
HOW TO FOLLOW: VIDEO: FanDuel Sports Network – AUDIO – ESPN LA App – TWITTER: @dooleylak & @lakings

TODAY’S MATCHUP: The Kings are back in action this evening to complete a back-to-back set, as they visit the St. Louis Blues for the first of three games between the two teams over the next eight days.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: The Kings posted a record of 1-1-1 against the Blues last season, losing both games played between the two teams in Missouri.

Forward Adrian Kempe led the way last season against St. Louis with three goals and four points from the 2023-24 season series, while defenseman Drew Doughty added three assists across the three meetings. Kempe has 10 career goals versus the Blues, tied for his second most against any one opponent.

KINGS VITALS: The Kings did not hold a morning skate in advance of tonight’s game, considering the back-to-back.

After goaltender Darcy Kuemper got the nod yesterday in Dallas, consider goaltender David Rittich the projected starter in net tonight in St. Louis. Rittich has seven career appearances against the Blues, posting a 2-1-2 record with a .881 save percentage and a 3.57 goals-against average.

For reference, here’s how the Kings lined up last night in Dallas –

Tonight's @LAKings Line Rushes –

Turcotte – Kopitar – Laferriere
Foegele – Danault – Moore
Fiala – Byfield – Kempe
Jeannot – Lewis

Anderson – Gavrikov
Edmundson – Doughty
Moverare – Spence
Clarke

Kuemper
Rittich

— Zach Dooley (@DooleyLAK) March 1, 2025

The Kings made a couple of changes for last night’s game, with defenseman Drew Doughty checking back into the lineup and a different look for the forwards. Should they look for any additional changes, forward Akil Thomas and defenseman Kyle Burroughs are options to play tonight against the Blues.

BLUES VITALS: Coming out of the midseason break, St. Louis has picked up a point in each of its first four games, with a record of 3-0-1 coming into tonight’s tilt.

Per Matthew DeFranks of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, here’s how the Blues lined up on Thursday against Washington –

Blues during warmup in Washington:
Neighbours-Thomas-Buchnevich
Holloway-Schenn-Kyrou
Joseph-Sundqvist-Bolduc
Toropchenko-Faksa-Walker

Fowler-Parayko
Broberg-Faulk
Suter-Leddy

Hofer
Binnington

— Matthew DeFranks (@MDeFranks) February 27, 2025

Expect to see former Kings forward Brayden Schenn in the lineup tonight for the hosts in game number 1,001 of his NHL regular-season career. Schenn reached the century mark last time out and could be honored before tonight’s game with a silver-stick ceremony. Schenn has a symmetrically distributed 20 points (10-10-20) from 32 games played against the Kings in his career to date.

Storyline Of The Day – Power Play
It’s not a new topic here. We’ve covered it at length throughout the season. The power play continues to be a topic of conversation, this time after a night when the Kings allowed two power-play goals and one shorthanded goal while they did not score on four opportunities.

Last night, Jim Hiller pointed to two teams with an opportunity to make plays under pressure.

“Those guys did and we haven’t. We haven’t for a long time, consistently.”

At 30th in the NHL, at 14.7 percent, the Kings have struggled in that area for some time. Really, outside of a three-goal outburst in Ottawa back in October, the Kings have been pretty stagnant in that area for the majority of the season. Take that out and the total drops another two percentage points, below 13. They scored against Utah and Vegas on the man advantage earlier this week, which offered perhaps some optimism of getting things going coming out of the break. The Kings didn’t overhaul the system over the time off, but they did refocus on certain areas they hoped could turn things around.

Last night, though, the power play could have been the difference in at least keeping the Kings in the game and it was not the case. On Wednesday against Vancouver, the power play cost the Kings the second point for sure in an overtime loss.

The top unit has seen personnel shift in and out throughout the season. I still think the five-forward look was the most effective, with Adrian Kempe up top, but it obviously wasn’t so effective that it stuck around. I don’t think there’s a world out there that things magically change and the Kings become one of the better PP’s in the NHL. But with 25 games left, they have to be able to find something to help bolster their 5-on-5 scoring. It doesn’t have to be number one. But it can’t be number 30 either.

Perhaps Dallas gave an example for what can be done. Both Stars goals were extremely simple. A double screen and deflection for a goal and a puck to the net with a player driving the net for a deflection on the go. It’s nothing crazy. It’s just simple hockey and the Stars dominated the netfront battle last night, both 5-on-5 and on special teams.

“They weren’t fancy, it was just pucks to the net and bodies to the net and they got the job done,” forward Phillip Danault said of the Dallas man advantage.

The Kings want to do that. They’re saying the right things in that way. But we’ve probably seen shots with no screen more often than the double screen Danault mentioned, which created the fourth Stars goal.

“We want to simplify and get things to the net and I know that’s what we always say, but that is honestly the most important thing,” defenseman Drew Doughty said. “Just have someone stand in front of the net and shoot the puck, crash the net hard and get a rebound goal. I don’t know when the last time [our unit] had a tip goal on the power play was, I think that’s important too.”

I do think Doughty helps. Tied for third in the NHL last season among defensemen as he scored seven power-play goals. Since Doughty’s return, the numbers say the Kings have seen an upturn in scoring chances and high-danger chances, but not an uptick in goals.

It’s a dollars and cents game, though.

It’s obviously been talked about quite a bit. It’s been practiced quite a bit. But it just is not producing and for a team that plays a lot of tight games, that unit can make all the difference. Whether it’s further changes to the system, moving personnel around differently, an external acquisition……I don’t know man. The Kings need more from that unit.

In the interim, perhaps the second unit could also merit a bit of a longer look. They didn’t start any of the four power plays last night but moved the puck well in limited time and had the better of the chances. They also scored against Vegas on Monday with a shot, screen and deflection. Trevor Moore narrowly missed the net on a one-timer from Danault. I thought Moore was a strong facilitator yesterday as well, working well from the left side of the umbrella. It wasn’t anything crazy, but it was simple and effective.

Despite playing less, the second unit had more than double in terms of expected goals last night on the PP. If the Kings get those looks tonight, it could be an opportunity to change the game. Got to find a way to make a difference in the game.

3 To Watch For
– The other side of that coin is that the Kings have to limit the unnecessary penalties. They gave up the two PPG’s last night but penalties caused three goals against, plus the shorthanded goal. It was obvious that the first penalty changed the game after the Kings started the game fairly well. While the high-sticking double minor wasn’t intentional, it was an offensive-zone penalty that led to two goals against. Trevor Lewis’ penalty was avoidable as well and directly led to a goal against.

For the fourth line in particular, they’ve been around a net-even for much of the season. That’s what the coaching staff is in search of but they’ve given some of that back in February, yesterday included.

St. Louis isn’t too far ahead of the Kings in terms of power-play percentage, coming in at 19.5 percent in 22nd place. Still, they have momentum of late as a team and should be a very desperate opponent, sitting three points out of the second wild card spot.

Avoid those types of penalties and keep the game on 5-on-5 terms, where the Kings like to play.

– Another goal last time out for Warren Foegele against a playoff club.

Also scored on Wednesday versus Vancouver and on Monday versus Vegas. Foegele has 17 goals in total this season and he’s buried 11 of those goals against the current playoff field, including one in all three games played against Dallas earlier this season.

“I think those competitive games bring the best out of me,” Foegele said. “I think one of my traits is that I’m super competitive and when you’re in those games, you get pretty fiery and you don’t want to lose. It’s fun playing those games because it’s usually best-on-best in a sense. It’s a lot of fun and it’s a lot better when you’re winning those games.”

If it’s fun when the Kings are winning those games, Foegele is having a bit of fun. Perhaps until last night, I suppose. He and his teammates are 8-2-1 in those 11 games, despite yesterday’s lopsided defeat versus Dallas. Not too shabby for a group that has greatly improved this season playing against higher-caliber competition, posting a .607 winning percentage against those clubs in total after struggling in that area in years past.

– If there’s something to draw confidence from tonight, it’s that the Kings have been in this situation before and found success.

Tonight will be the tenth back-to-back completion of the season and the Kings are one of eight teams in the NHL to average 1.2 points-per-game or better on the back half of those situations.

Kings have played in that scenario nine times this season. They know how to handle it. Hiller said that once yesterday’s game got out of reach, he scaled back certain players to try and conserve some energy for tomorrow.

Joel Edmundson didn’t play over the last 10 minutes of the game, while Brandt Clarke logged nearly half of those 10 minutes. Guys like Lewis and Jeannot played 3-4 minutes while Anze Kopitar played just one. Did what could be done, in the moment, to spare guys. See if it pays off.

“It’s that time of the year, you’re getting close to 60 games in, you’ve done this many times, dealt with the travel, so we have a lot of experience with it,” Jim Hiller said. “We have a chance, where the game went at the end, we were able to pull some guys back, Eddy didn’t play all that much. So, we’ll hopefully be as fresh as we can tomorrow and get after a team in St. Louis that’s going good, three in a row, playing well. That’ll be a challenge.”

Kings and Blues this evening in St. Louis. Big chance to bounce back and earn a split before the trip finale in Chicago on Monday night.