FINAL – Kings 3, Jets 0 – Kempe, Doughty, Hiller

It was a big night for milestones as the LA Kings (6-4-4) defeated Winnipeg Jets (9-4-0) by a final score of 3-0 on Tuesday night at Crypto.com Arena, earning their first home win of the 2025-26 regular season.

Goaltender Darcy Kuemper finished with 23 saves to earn his first shutout of the season, while Drew Doughty scored an empty-net goal in the final minute to become the team’s all-time goal scoring leader among defenders, Adrian Kempe scored the 200th goal of his career and Corey Perry added an assist in his 1,400th career NHL game.

The Kings got off to the start they were looking for defensively and did not allow a shot on goal from Winnipeg for the first eight minutes of the first period. What would’ve been the first shot for the Jets ended up in the net, but was quickly disallowed due to goaltender interference on former Kings forward Gabriel Vilardi. The call was held up after a coach’s challenge by the visitors.

With less than three minutes remaining in the opening period, one of the Kings new-look lines cashed in, with the help of Joel Armia, who made a strong play in the offensive zone. Armia controlled the puck behind the net and eventually found Kempe open in front of the net for the finish at 17:09.

The milestone goal also had an assist credited to Mikey Anderson, his first helper of the season.

Neither team was able to get on the board during the second and LA carried its one-goal lead into the final frame. Through 40 minutes, the Kings allowed only 13 shots on goal to the league’s top offensive team.

Kevin Fiala added insurance with five minutes left to play, capitalizing on a double-minor penalty to Winnipeg’s Vladislav Namestnikov who hit Perry with a high stick. Fiala wristed a shot past goaltender Connor Hellebuyck on the power play for his sixth strike of the year and made it a 2-0 game. Assists on the play went to Perry, who had just re-joined the game after absorbing the penalty, as well as Quinton Byfield.

Doughty put the game away with 54 seconds left on the clock, scoring his 162nd career goal in unassisted fashion to pass Rob Blake and set a new franchise record.

Fiala’s tally was the lone man-advantage goal of the contest, with the Kings going 1-for-6 on the power play while holding Winnipeg to an 0-for-5 mark.

Postgame thoughts from Kempe and Doughty, as well as head coach Jim Hiller are below.

Adrian Kempe

Drew Doughty
On how special the milestone is to him
It feels special for sure. It’s a huge honor. I looked up to Rob Blake as a young boy being an LA Kings fan. When you come into the league it’s never something you even think of. So it’s kind of shocking that this all happened but obviously very proud and so thankful for the organization and my teammates especially, couldn’t have done it without them.

On playing with Mikey Anderson again after some time apart
We were good. We played that top line the entire night and they didn’t get much. They might’ve gotten a couple chances here and there, but when you play against some of the best players in the world, that’s going to happen. We did a great job, it was like we never left each other.

On Corey Perry and his play during his 1,400th game
He’s always in the thick of things. Even tonight, he gets one in the face and is crying, trying to get back on the ice for the 5-on-3, he couldn’t even open his eyes and he’s trying to get back out there so it just shows you his heart, how much he loves the game of hockey and how much he’ll do for his teammates. No surprise to me, another guy that I watched growing up and no surprise to me that he’s played in 1,400.

On the way the team is playing overall
I definitely think we’re on the right track, but we need to score more goals. We can’t be having a 1-0 lead, I mean we can, but it’s not ideal. We want to have a two or three goal lead going into the third period. It’s hard to hold on to a one-goal lead, all of a sudden one shot goes in and everything deflates. It’s hard to hold on to those. We did a good job but I think we need to get some more insurance goals.

Jim Hiller
On the way his team won the game
I’ll take any win, you know me. I think we played to our identity, and you have to start there, you can’t come off that. Because then you get in all kinds of trouble. We’re going to start scoring more, I really believe that. We got some really good looks again tonight. Hellebuyck played well, but we’ll take the zero and we’ll take the win.

On the performance of Kuemper in the game
I thought Hellebuyck played really well but Kuemps gets the shutout in the end and he made three or four that I thought were really important saves. He did his job, and it’s up and down the lineup tonight. Everyone did their part and it’s a hard game against a really good team. There’s not a lot of room out there either way so you might come up relatively empty on the scoresheet but that doesn’t mean you didn’t play well. It’s just one of those games. They’re kind of a playoff-style team and it was kind of a playoff-style game.

On the play of the Kings special teams units in the win
Well, the first one is we win the special teams battle. When we went up to Winnipeg I thought it was a similar game, it was an even game, we lose the special teams battle and we lose the game. Tonight, we win the special teams battle so that was important to win it. Our power play wasn’t great at 5-on-4, at 5-on-3 we had some really good looks that Hellebuyck saved, but I thought our penalty kill was the best that it’s been tonight. I thought we were more aggressive tonight than we had been. It looked a little bit more like it did last year, so that was probably the highlight of the night for me against an elite power play unit.

Notes –
– Forward Adrian Kempe (1-0=1) scored his sixth goal of the season––the 200th goal of his career––in the first period of tonight’s contest, which ultimately stood as the game-winning goal. The native of Kramfors, Sweden, is the 33rd Swedish-born player and the ninth player from the 2014 NHL Draft class to reach the 200-goal milestone in his career.
– Kempe is also the 10th player in franchise history to score 200 goals in a Kings uniform.
– The 29-year-old forward also extended his point streak against the Manitoba-based franchise to a sixth straight contest (5-5=10 in 6 GP), dating back to April 1, 2024, which is the longest active point streak against Winnipeg among any League skater.
– Forward Kevin Fiala (1-0=1) scored his second power play goal of the season to double the Kings’ lead in the final frame. By doing so, he rejoined Kempe atop the Kings’ leaderboard in goals and surpassing him as the Kings’ leading power play producer this season with five points (2-3=5).
– Defenseman Drew Doughty (1-0=1) iced the Kings victory with his 162nd career goal, breaking a tie with Rob Blake (161) for the most by a blueliner in franchise history.
– Forward Joel Armia (0-1=1) played in his 600th career regular season NHL contest tonight, becoming the 33rd player of Finnish nationality to reach this mark.
– Armia also earned his fifth assist of the campaign, making him the 24th player in Kings franchise history to find the scoresheet in their 600th career regular season appearance. The last individual to do so was defenseman Joel Edmundson, who also had an assist in career game #600 against the Winnipeg Jets at Crypto.com Arena on April 1, 2025.
– Defenseman Mikey Anderson (0-1=1) notched his first assist of the campaign and now has a pair of points across two straight games against Winnipeg, following his first goal of the season on Oct. 11 at Canada Life Centre.
– Forward Corey Perry (0-1=1) skated in his 1,400th career regular season NHL game this evening, becoming the 44th player in League history to reach the milestone. The native of Peterborough, Ontario, is joined by Brent Burns (1,510 GP), Alex Ovechkin (1,503 GP) and Anze Kopitar (1,463 GP) as the fourth active player to reach the 1,400-game milestone.
– With his assist on Fiala’s third-period marker, Perry becomes the 18th of those 44 members of the 1,400-game club to find the scoresheet in the milestone game. Perry became the second player in franchise history with a point in his 1,400th career game, joining Anze Kopitar (0-1=1) on Dec. 7, 2024, against Minnesota.
– Center Quinton Byfield (0-1=1) recorded his 100th career assist tonight with his power play helper on Fiala’s . There have only been eight players to record 100 assists with the franchise before turning 24 years of age and only two in the last 30 years: Anze Kopitar (220A before 24 y.o.) and Drew Doughty (145A before 24 y.o.).
– Goaltender Darcy Kuemper turned aside all 23 of the Jets’ shots on goal tonight to earn his fourth victory, and first shutout, of the year. It also marked his first career shutout against the Winnipeg Jets.

The Kings are scheduled to practice on Wednesday morning, November 5 at 11 AM at Toyota Sports Performance Center and then host the Florida Panthers on Thursday night, November 6 at 7 PM at Crypto.com Arena.