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1/11 Preview – Traveling With The Home Game + Moverare/Spence Elevate, LAFD Patches, TSPC Drop-Off

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WHO: Los Angeles Kings (24-10-5) 2 Calgary Flames (18-14-7)
WHAT: 2024-25 Regular-Season Game
WHEN: Saturday, January 11 @ 7:00 PM Pacific
WHERE: Scotiabank Saddledome – Calgary, AB
HOW TO FOLLOW: VIDEO: Fan Duel Sports Network – AUDIO – ESPN LA App – TWITTER: @dooleylak & @lakings

TODAY’S MATCHUP: The Kings continue on their five-game roadtrip, as they conclude a back-to-back set tonight against the Calgary Flames.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: The Flames won the first game of the season between the teams, a 3-1 victory here in Calgary Saddledome back in November.

Forward Trevor Moore scored his team’s only goal in that game, with forwards Quinton Byfield and Anze Kopitar collecting the assists. Kopitar has six points (1-5-6) over the last two seasons against the Flames to lead all Kings skaters.

The Kings and Flames were set to meet on Wednesday in Los Angeles, but the game was postponed on account of the fires in the area. That game will be made up later in the season.

KINGS VITALS: Coming off last night’s win over the Winnipeg Jets, the Kings did not hold a morning skate today in Calgary.

With the back-to-back, look for goaltender David Rittich to get the nod, after Darcy Kuemper picked up the victory last night versus the Jets. For Rittich, he played in Calgary from 2017-21 and is in line to face his former team for the fourth time in his career. Rittich has a record of 0-1-2 against the Flames, with a .868 save percentage and a 4.24 goals-against average.

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

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

Anderson – Gavrikov
Moverare – Spence
Englund – Clarke
Burroughs

Kuemper / Rittich

Defenseman Joel Edmundson missed yesterday’s game due to injury. Edmundson took the morning skate in Winnipeg yesterday in a full-contact capacity, but was on late with forwards Samuel Helenius and Akil Thomas. Unclear on if he will go tonight. If he does, would assume he slots in next to Brandt Clarke, in place of Andreas Englund, but expecting to hear from Jim Hiller tonight at the rink before the game.

Forwards Samuel Helenius and Akil Thomas are available should the Kings look to make any additional changes.

FLAMES VITALS: Calgary hasn’t played since Tuesday, a 3-2 overtime victory over the Anaheim Ducks.

Per Pat Steinberg of Sportsnet 960, here’s how the Flames lined up at today’s morning skate –

California native Dustin Wolf got the start yesterday against the Ducks and while he was not scheduled to play against the Kings in the game that was ultimately postponed, he is expected to get the nod tonight in Calgary.

Forward Mikael Backlund led the Flames with two points in their 3-1 win over the Kings last time out, giving him four points (2-2-4) against Los Angeles over the last two seasons and 21 (8-13-21) for his career against Los Angeles. Forward Connor Zary suffered a lower-body injury in Anaheim and will not play tonight for the hosts.

Storyline Of The Day – Packing The Home Game To Go
It’s no secret that the Kings have been a better home team than a road team this season.

That’s not all that uncommon. It stands to reason that teams would perform better at home than on the road. But still, the disparity for the Kings is greater than most. At 14-2-1, no team in the NHL has been better than the Kings this season in their own building, with their .853 points percentage leading the league. On the road, the Kings haven’t been bad. 10-8-4 is firmly in the middle of the pack in the NHL.

Going into the holiday break, the Kings posted a 3-2-2 record on a season-long, seven-game trip. They felt their level of play was better than the record, with Jim Hiller saying he felt the Kings “could have gotten more points”, despite being generally happy with how the team played.

“Prior to Christmas, we developed a good road game, had a rhythm,” he said. “Now, we’ve been at home for so long that our concern was to get back to the road mentality and re-establish our road game. There is a change, when you have a block of 20 days on the road and then a block of 20 days at home, it takes a little time.”

The recent block of time at home led to a 4-0-0 homestand, coming out of the NHL’s holiday break, with the fifth game on Wednesday postponed. With how strong the Kings have been on home ice, we haven’t always seen that home performance, that home style and level of play, come with the team on the road. Perhaps until last night in Winnipeg.

It’s not as if the Kings weren’t trying to do the same things on the road as they have at home. But still, they talked about it as a team before yesterday’s game. For at least the first 40 minutes against the Jets, we saw that home Kings team. The results were quite impressive, holding Winnipeg to just nine shots on goal through two periods.

“It’s something we talked about going into this trip here, that we have to bounce back a little bit on this road trip,” forward Adrian Kempe said. “When you’re playing at home, you have the atmosphere, you have fans in the back and it’s easy to ride that momentum wave. I think we did a really good job from the start [last night] of not just taking their fans out of building but sticking to our game and trusting each other out there.”

The fan element is obvious. As Kempe noted, taking the fans out of the game in Winnipeg for 40+ minutes was big, as the Kings imposed their game early. At home, they’ve done a good job of engaging the crowd, helping to drive strong performances.

The Kings naturally want to play in front of their fans and they’ve given everyone a lot of reason to celebrate at Crypto.com Arena. Still though, there are 41 games away from home and last night was a big step forward in that area.

“I think one of the biggest reasons why we’re doing well at home is because of our fans,” defenseman Jordan Spence added. “Especially coming out and doing it the way that we do, the two periods that we had, I think it just gave us a feel with what’s happening back [in Los Angeles]. We want to make them proud and we want to win every game as much as possible. We were really happy with our game, but it’s just first game of our road trip, so hopefully we can keep it going and go from there.”

There are competitive advantages playing at home, giving Jim Hiller and his staff last change to help dictate matchups and the schedule is less taxing without flights, hotels and travel.

But still, the game is objectively the same on the road. With 41 of each, you can’t just rely on home success to reach the playoffs and ultimately succeed upon getting there. Yesterday seemed to be a good starting point for the Kings in helping to level the playing field a little bit. Strong showing on the road, aginst a good team that plays well on home ice. Give the Kings credit for that showing.

“We hadn’t been on the road for so long now, that that was one of the concerns,” Hiller added. “We just slipped right back into it, so, yeah, I have to give the guys credit.”

3 To Watch For –
– After the game yesterday, Hiller singled out two players for their performance – defensemen Jacob Moverare and Jordan Spence.

“Two guys in particular, if I have to mention somebody, were Spence and Moverare,” Hiller said. “You know, they played a lot of minutes, played together, I thought they gave us a really, really good game. So those two really were big part of the win.”

With Edmundson out, it was a committee approach for those two players on the blueline. As I watched the game, it just felt like I saw 43 in white on the ice more yesterday than any other game in recent memory. And I was correct in that assumption. Moverare played 19:11 in total, after averaging 11:54 per game this season entering yesterday. He finished the evening with an assist and a +1 rating. With Moverare on the ice, the Kings had 11 scoring chances for, compared to just four against. No Kings defenseman was on the ice for more scoring chances than Moverare.

Moverare isn’t a flashy player and he wasn’t yesterday. He just plays a simple and effective game. Him playing that style allows Spence to flourish, with the two forming a formidable pairing. Great stuff from the Swede. With Edmundson’s status for tonight’s game questionable at this time, the Kings could need a similar showing from Moverare again tonight in Calgary.

– Noted in yesterday’s preview that the Kings would be wearing LAFD stickers on their helmets. Announced later in the day, after yesterday’s story, is that the Kings will also wear an LAFD patch on their left shoulder of their road jerseys for the duration of the trip, beginning with yesterday’s game in Winnipeg.

The Kings will wear both the helmet stickers and jersey patches for the duration of the trip, in support of the LAFD.

– The Kings also announced that, beginning today, Toyota Sports Performance Center will serve as a collection site for items to support those impacted by the fires. The collection drive is being run in partnership with the NFL’s Los Angeles Chargers.

Sought items to be donated are as follows – Toiletry Items, Feminine Products, Clothing, Bbay Essentials, + Diapers, Children’s Toys, Pillows + Blankets, Phone Chargers, Bottled Water, Canned/Non-Perishable Food, Pet Supplies, Gently Used Hockey Gear

The drive is currently scheduled to run from January 11 through January 19, from 10 AM – 7 PM daily.

All items donated will be delivered to local YMCA’s, who are currently on the front lines distributing the products to those in need.

Kings and Flames conclude the back-to-back set this evening in Calgary! Hockey Night in Canada for those watching North of the Border, regular broadcast back in LA. See if the Kings can find a rare win in Calgary to cap off what would make for a truly impressive back-to-back.

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