FINAL – Kings 6, Golden Knights 5 – Foegele, Clarke, Hiller

The LA Kings pulled out an entertaining victory in Las Vegas, skating to a 6-5 win over the Vegas Golden Knights on Sunday evening at T-Mobile Arena.

The visitors opened the scoring through forward Anze Kopitar, who scored for the third time in four games to put the Kings ahead 1-0. Stationed in front of the net, Kopitar got a deflection on a point shot from defenseman Joel Edmundson, redirecting the puck past Vegas netminder Adin Hill for his 16th goal of the season.

With just over a minute remaining in the opening frame, defenseman Brandt Clarke doubled his team’s lead heading into the first intermission. Activating from the right point, Clarke won a puck battle in the slot, moved in on Hill and deked to the backhand for the goal, his fifth of the season. Clarke’s goal made it a multi-point night, while Edmundson collected the secondary assist on the play, giving him two helpers for the game.

Just shy of two minutes into the second period, the Kings made it 3-0 as forward Quinton Byfield extended his scoring streak to three games. Forward Alex Laferriere started the play with an outlet pass to Byfield in transition, with the centerman then dishing wide to forward Kevin Fiala down the left wing. Fiala dragged the puck into a dangerous area for the shot, with Byfield getting the deflection on the way through for his 14th goal of the season and a three-goal lead.

Exactly five minutes into the second period, Vegas got on the board as their fourth line created a goal. Forward Nicolas Roy worked out of the corner and into the low slot on his backhand, putting a shot on goal that just snuck through Kings netminder David Rittich and in for his eighth goal of the season, cutting the Kings advantage to 3-1 in the process.

Vegas pulled back to within a goal just before the halfway point of the second period, with forward Tomas Hertl burying his team-leading 25th goal of the season to make it a 3-2 game. Working around the back of the net, Hertl swung out into the slot, on his forehand, and shot inside the far post and into the back of the net for the goal, as the hosts made it a one-goal game.

As the second period wound down, forward Warren Foegele scored a massive insurance goal with just 69 seconds on the clock, putting the Kings back ahead by two. Foegele worked his way in down the right wing, shielded the puck to get to the net and finished with a shot just underneath the crossbar for his 18th goal of the season, restoring the two-goal advantage heading into the second intermission.

Early in the third period, Kings forward Trevor Moore scored a terrific individual goal to push the Kings back ahead by three. Moore danced his way off the wall on the left side, got the puck onto his forehand and beat Hill clean with a wrist shot from the circle for his 13th goal of the season. Foegele and forward Phillip Danault had the assists on the play, making it a multi-point night for both players.

With 11:31 remaining in the third period, Vegas converted on the first power play of the game for either team, pulling back to within 5-3. The Golden Knights worked the puck around the offensive zone before forward Mark Stone fed Hertl in the low slot for the goal, his second of the game, as the Kings saw their lead drop back to two goals midway through the third.

Los Angeles responded with a power-play goal of its own later in the third period, with forward Adrian Kempe getting in on the scoring to complete his own multi-point effort. Skating in transition, the Kings quickly worked the puck up the ice to Kempe, who got in on a breakaway and finished through the five hole for his team-leading 27th goal of the season and a 6-3 advantage.

The hosts answered right back, however, pulling once again back to within two goals. Korczak flipped the puck into the offensive zone and it caught Clarke in an awkward area in the midsection. He lost possession and forward Brandon Saad quickly pounced on the puck and fired past Rittich from the slot, making it a 6-4 game.

Hertl completed his hat trick late in the game with his third of the night, as the Golden Knights closed the score to 6-5. Stationed in front of the net, Hertl again buried a centering feed from Stone, converting from a tight angle to make it a one-goal game in a 6-on-5 scenario. For the Czech forward, it was the seventh hat trick of his NHL career.

Hear from Clarke, Foegele and Head Coach Jim Hiller following tonight’s win.

Warren Foegele

Brandt Clarke
On a wild game tonight and finding a way to get the job done
Situationally on this back-to-back, coming here against a really good team, after playing a really good team yesterday, it’s a tough spot, but I think this just proves we can get it done when times are tough. This isn’t the typical, grinding, low-scoring Kings win, but we’ll take them however they come.

On if this was one of the most-dangerous offensive games of the season
I think so. I think with everyone, it was kind of like a monkey see, monkey do thing too. One guy made a play, then the next guy wanted to make a play and it just kind of snowballed from there, especially in the first period. Yeah, we’re feeling good of ourselves out of the gates and then we just tried to weather the storm when they turned it on in the second and then it was kind of back and forth in the third. We were happy to come away with the win.

On how he read his goal tonight
They were giving us time and space at the top, so Juice took a took a nice one timer on the ice and I knew there would be a rebound, just kind of wait and see it would we go. I popped over to the slot, there was kind of open ice there, so I just jumped around my guy and tried to make a play on that. I was happy with it went in.

On taking the risk at the right time to make a play
It’s just being instinctual. You don’t want to make a play that’ll put you out of position or where it’s not 100 percent sure you can get the puck or whatever the case may be. but Yeah, just that spot, I knew we were probably going to end up with the puck regardless of where it was and luckily, it popped over to the slot and I had some speed already turning the corner, so I could beat my guy to the puck. Just made a play and it went in, so I was happy.

On how good a night like this feels after a difficult few weeks
I’d say so, yeah, I was happy. It’s definitely tough being in and out, but that just kind of grew my hunger to want to make a difference when I was back in. I love being part of this team, I love being in this in this locker room and that’s all I want to do. I just want to help the team the best I can and it was nice that I popped up on the scoresheet tonight, but I just think things have been going good recently, regardless. It’s been good.

Jim Hiller
On finding a way to win an entertaining game tonight
Entertaining, first of all. I think all four games you can throw the score out, probably in all four games with Vegas, and say, you know what, there were four pretty good hockey games. We got on the right side of three of them but I thought all four games were just good games. I don’t know if we expected 11 tonight, that’s usually not our style, nor theirs. Good on us to hang on at the end. It was closer than we wanted to be but we still got it done.

On the team’s play at the offensive end of the ice specifically
Well, the first period was excellent, one of our best of the year, for sure. Second period, we knew they were going to come, they weren’t going to be happy with that, but I thought we thought we created a lot. I know we scored but it felt like maybe we could have had a couple more on the rush. Foegs’ goal changed the game because they pushed and that was a big-time goal. We don’t see a lot of those individual efforts where one guy just kind of goes and does it on his own and we saw two tonight, Moresies too. That was the goal, I thought, that was most important.

On the momentum-changing nature of Foegele’s goal
Yeah, we were on our heels, they controlled the period, they got inside us, they got inside our five and they scored twice that way, but more than we would typically like to give them. I thought it changed momentum a little bit for our guys to gather their breath and get to the intermission. I thought we came up good in the third until the last four or five minutes.

On Brandt Clarke’s goal and his reading of the play to create it
Yeah, all of our D have, in that situation [the read to go]. We had three high, Juice is at the top and if you saw Eddy, he was on the way too, the rebound happened to go to Clarkie’s side. That’s a situation where most guys get the green light, that’s not a that’s not even really a read, but it came out to him and he made a great finish. I loved the finish. You can get there and get the opportunity, but Clarkie has that ability to just be poised in that area. Just a nice finish.

On the Kings winning more games this season against the NHL’s top teams
If you want to be one of the upper echelon teams, you better be able to play with them. I think that’s the way we look at it. These are really good teams. St. Louis is playing as well as anybody, we’ve talked about that, and if we want to be an upper-echelon team, if we think we are, well, then it requires some effort and some concentration. I liked our response, I know people will get down on us pretty quickly, but I really liked our response. I thought we were better against St Louis lost in the shootout, really good last night and then this was the big test and we pushed again. I’m proud of the guys.

Notes –
• Captain Anze Kopitar (1-1=2) scored the game-opening goal for the second time in less than 24 hours by steering home his 16th tally and 50th point (16-35=51) of the season. He then recorded his 35th assist of the campaign on the Kings’ sixth goal of the evening, his 439th power play point. With his man-advantage assist, Kopitar broke a three-way tie with Doug Weight and Patrick Kane to take sole possession of the 42nd most power play points in League history.
• Kopitar’s 435th career goal clinches his 18th different 50-point campaign. Per NHL PR, he is just third player in NHL history born and trained outside of North America with 18 career 50-point seasons, joining Jaromir Jagr (20) and Alex Ovechkin (18).
• The all-time leading scorer against the Golden Knights, Kopitar now has 41 total points (16-25=41) against the club and has notched nine points (4-5=9) in the two teams’ six most recent meetings, dating to Nov. 8, 2023.
• Defenseman Brandt Clarke (1-1=2) corralled Kempe’s rebound and tucked his fifth goal of the season. The native of Nepean, Ontario also collected a secondary helper on the game-opening goal, his 22nd assist of the year. Per NHL PR, Clarke is the first Kings blueliner 22-years-old or younger to score five goals in a campaign.
• Clarke’s fifth career multi-point outing boosts his 2024-25 point total to 27 (5-22=27), the most by a Kings defender this season.
• Winger Warren Foegele (1-1=2) roofed his 18th tally of the year, his fourth goal in as many games against Vegas. He becomes the third player in League history to record a four-game goal streak against the team in a single season, joining Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl (5 G in 4GP in 2022-23) and Minnesota’s Kirill Kaprizov (6 G in 5 GP in 2020-2021).
• Foegele later contributed his 17th assist of the year to reach the 100-mark in his career while clocking his ninth multi-point performance of the season to sit two such games back of the career high (11) he set last season in Edmonton.
• Forward Adrian Kempe (1-1=2) scored his fifth power play goal of the season, standing as his fourth game-winning goal of the year. Earlier, the native of Kramfors, Sweden, picked up his 26th assist of the season on Clarke’s tally in the closing minutes of the opening frame.
• Kempe has six points (2-4=6) in his last three games of played against Vegas (0-2=2 on Feb. 24 and (1-1=2 on Oct. 30, 2024) to bring his career total against the club to 29 points
(10-19=29) in 26 appearances. He is now tied with Connor McDavid (10-19=29) for the third most points scored against the Vegas Golden Knights, trailing only Kopitar (15- 24=39) and Draisaitl (12-18=30).
• Center Quinton Byfield (1-0=1) scored his second goal in as many days after beating the Vegas netminder for his 14th goal of the season. Per NHL PR, he is the first Kings player, age 22 or younger, to score in three straight games since Matt Luff had a four-game goal streak for the club in 2018-19. The longest goa streak in franchise history by a player before their 23rd birthday is shared between Jimmy Carson (7 GP in 1986-87) and Bernie Nicholls (7 GP in 1982-83).
• Forward Trevor Moore (1-0=1) scored his 13th goal of the year, his fifth goal in his last six games against the Pacific Division rival Golden Knights, dating to Nov. 8, 2023.
• Defenseman Joel Edmundson (0-2=2) put the puck on net for Kopitar’s deflection to register his 10th assist of the season, then added his 11th helper of the year on Clarke’s goal. The 6-5, 220-pound blueliner has now found the scoresheet (2-3=5) in all four of the Kings games against the Vegas Golden Knights this season, joining the Flames’ MacKenzie Weegar (1-4=5) as the only blueliners to record a four-game point streak in one season against the Golden Knights in a League history.
• Forward Phillip Danault (0-2=2) registered his 27th and 28th assists of the season, the second most on the team behind Kopitar’s 34 helpers through the year’s first 62 games.
• Forwards Kevin Fiala (0-2=2) and Alex Laferriere (0-1=1) each picked up their 17th assists of the season on Byfield’s marker early into the middle frame. Fiala then added his 18th of the year on Kempe’s power play goal in the third period.
• Defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov (0-1=1) collected his 19th assist of the season and his joined by Foegele as the second member of the Kings to collect their 100th career helper tonight at T-Mobile Center. He becomes the eighth defenseman selected in the 2015 NHL Draft to reach 100 career assists.
• In total, the Kings had seven different players with multiple points in the same game for the sixth time since 2011-12. Per NHL PR, the others are Feb. 9, 2016 (8), March 20, 2023 (8), March 20, 2024 (7), Nov. 29, 2022 (7) and Oct. 15, 2022 (7).
• Goaltender David Rittich made 27 saves on the outing to improve his season record to 13-12-2. With his 13th win of the year, the native of Jihlava, Czechia, matches his win total
from last season and is tied for the third highest in his career.
• The Kings recorded their 18th win against the Golden Knights, which is the most among all teams. Per NHL PR, they also recorded their ninth win in Vegas, which is the also the most among all teams.

The Kings have a scheduled day off tomorrow, before returning to action for morning skate on Tuesday at 10:30 AM, in advance of that evening’s game versus the New York Islanders.