3/11 Preview – Same Lineup Expected + Doughty Maintenance, Scoring Six, Helenius Fight

WHO: Los Angeles Kings (33-20-9) vs. New York Islanders (29-27-7)
WHAT: 2024-25 Regular-Season Game
WHEN: Tuesday, March 11 @ 7:30 PM Pacific
WHERE: Crypto.com Arena – Los Angeles, CA
HOW TO FOLLOW: VIDEO: FanDuel Sports Network – AUDIO – ESPN LA App – TWITTER: @dooleylak & @lakings

TODAY’S MATCHUP: The Kings are back in Los Angeles for the first of three games this week on home ice, beginning with tonight’s matchup against the New York Islanders.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: The Kings took the first meeting this season with the Islanders by a 3-1 score at UBS Arena back in December.

Forward Adrian Kempe collected a goal and an assist in that game while forward Kevin Fiala and defenseman Mikey Anderson also scored in the victory. Kempe has scored a goal in each of his last three games played against the Islanders and he’s collected a point in four straight, dating back to the 2022-23 season.

KINGS VITALS: The Kings held a mostly full-team morning skate today coming off of yesterday’s full team off day.

Look for goaltender Darcy Kuemper to get the start between the pipes this evening to begin the homestand, after he was the first netminder off after today’s morning skate. Kuemper has a lifetime record of 7-6-2 against the Islanders with a .906 save percentage and a 2.65 goals-against average.

Here’s how the Kings lined up this morning –

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

Anderson – Burroughs (Doughty)
Gavrikov – Spence
Edmundson – Clarke
Moverare

Kuemper / Rittich

First things first, defenseman Drew Doughty was not on the ice today for morning skate. Per Jim Hiller, Doughty will play tonight, but we should expect to see some maintenance days for him at times as we go forward. He didn’t seem particularly concerned by that this morning, so I won’t be either.

Kyle Burroughs took Doughty’s place in line rushes and Jordan Spence filled in on PP1. Expecting Doughty to assume both roles again tonight.

After consecutive wins and good performances, the Kings are not expected to make any changes to the group that picked up wins over St. Louis and Vegas.

The Kings are currently carrying 24 players on their active roster, with forwards Trevor Lewis and Akil Thomas, as well as Burroughs and defensemen Jacob Moverare being options to enter the lineup if any changes were needed.

ISLANDERS VITALS: New York has been up and down since returning from the break, posting a record of 4-4-0 in their eight games back.

Per Andrew Gross of Newsday, here’s how the Islanders lined up on Sunday against Anaheim –

#Isles in warmups
Duclair-Horvat-Palmieri
Lee-Pageau-Holmstrom
Fasching-Cizikas-Tsyplakov
Engvall-Boqvist-Gatcomb
Romanov-DeAngelo
Pelech-Dobson
Mayfield-Pulock
Hogberg
Sorokin

— Andrew Gross (@AGrossNewsday) March 10, 2025

New York enters tonight’s game five points out of the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. The Islanders remain without their number-one center, Matthew Barzal, due to injury, while their number-two center for much of the season, Brock Nelson, was traded to Colorado last week. Leading scorer and team captain Anders Lee has 24 goals this season and has 11 goals from 19 career games played against the Kings in his career.

Storyline Of The Day – What Does 6-5 Say?
“This wasn’t the typical, grinding, low-scoring Kings win, but we’ll take them however they come.”

This is a family-friendly blog, so I won’t say it. But no……bleep.

The quote came from defenseman Brandt Clarke, speaking after the win in Vegas on Sunday. A 6-5 victory, on the road, against the Pacific Division leaders. Over the last two seasons, this and last, not one time did the Kings give up five or more goals and win a game. We have to go back to the 2022-23 season, when the Kings actually did it four separate times, winning 6-5 twice and 7-6 twice.

The last time they accomplished the feat was a 7-6 win over St. Louis in March 2023. Of the 18 skaters who dressed for the Kings in that game, nine of them no longer play for the team. So, it’s fair to say it’s been a bit since we’ve seen that type of Kings victory.

“Hopefully [it means] that we can win in a lot of different ways, some resiliency,” forward Trevor Moore said. “Obviously we don’t want to be letting up that many goals, letting teams back into it, but they’re a good team and you’ve got to give them credit.”

I thought it was a notable victory for a couple of different reasons. For an offensively challenged team, obviously scoring six goals is notable. For a team that has averaged 2.51 goals per game this season on the road, exploding for six is extremely noticeable, especially after a recent road trip that saw the Kings score four total goals in three games played.

So, the six goals were really nice.

“It shows us all that we can score goals, so that’s awesome and a confidence boost,” forward Kevin Fiala said. “We just have to keep it up offensively. Obviously, defensively, we have to tighten up some things, but just go have a good one tonight.”

From a coaching standpoint, Jim Hiller was certainly pleased with the six goals. He also felt that the Kings controlled the majority of the chances in the game overall, minus that stretch in the second period, but that Vegas capitalized on their high-danger chances. You let Tomas Hertl get an open look from two feet out and he’s going to bury it most nights.

Overall, though, I think he felt quite pleased with the offensive output from that game, stemming from the Kings creating chances at a very high rate, with a ton of quality. That’s a positive, for sure.

“I love that we scored six and we really had the majority of the chances in the game,” Hiller said this morning. “It’s not a slight on David, we gave up some really high-quality chances that they finished on, but generally, they didn’t have as much as they would typically have, so I’ll look past the score on that one……I’ll take the six and more on.”

Look, I wouldn’t have pegged a Kings/Golden Knights game as a 6-5 game. I would say the same thing tonight in a Kings/Islanders game. Two teams known for stingy play screams 2-1, not 6-5. But it was nice to see that the Kings could win a game like that in a different way. See if there’s anything in that continuing into tonight.

3 To Watch For –
– So after saying all of that……now it’s about the Kings and the Islanders. We don’t see teams like the Islanders all that often. Once per season in each market.

On paper, there are some similarities between the two clubs. So, for the entire above section about a 6-5 game, tonight is still two of the NHL’s lowest-scoring teams. The Kings have scored 177 goals this season while New York has scored 173. That makes the Islanders the lowest-scoring team in the Eastern Conference. The Kings are the second-lowest scoring team in the current playoff field. Both teams have struggled on the power play certainly. While the Kings have been the better defensive team, New York is no slouch either.

Over now the last four seasons against New York, the Kings have a record of 6-0-1, including three wins on home ice. Of those seven games, five have combined for five or fewer goals, including the 3-1 victory for the Kings on Long Island earlier this season. The two that didn’t were both 5-2 Kings wins with an empty-net goal, so take those out and it would be seven of seven at six total goals or fewer.

Perhaps they’ll defy the odds. Again, I wouldn’t have pegged Kings/Golden Knights to be an 11-goal thriller either. But this one feels…..low scoring.

– One more note from the Vegas game.

On forward Samuel Helenius, Jim Hiller complemented his physicality against Vegas. He wants Helenius to be willing to drop the gloves when needed and it’s clear his teammates appreciated what he did against defenseman Nic Hague, as they awarded him the “Driver of the Game” in the room, on a night when seven players had multiple points.

In the case of our game versus Vegas, the building was a little quiet, that building is never quiet and it came alive again. I talked to Sammy today, you give him so much respect for a young player taking on any comers, so that’s where you’ve got to start. Was the timing perfect? No it wasn’t. That’s something he’s going to have to be able to distinguish in the future, but iot’s not a situation where I would go to him and say ‘what are you doing’. He’s still learning and again, give him the courage for standing up for himself and the team.”

Hiller was not mad at Helenius in that moment. He isn’t going to bench him for it. In fact, I think it’s clear he really, really likes Helenius and he added that Helenius had a good game.

– Lastly, Insiders, I will have Insider Suite Night information distributed this afternoon!

For those who don’t know, the game will be on Saturday, March 22 against Carolina. 1 PM Puck Drop. Tickets are $75 each. That is for the ticket only, but working on a few add-ons for those able to attend.

For those who have already reached out, you will be included on the email as is. For those who haven’t, but would like to attend, zdooley@lakings.com and I can add you to the list! If you don’t hear from me today, please email me and I will send the details!

Looking forward to a fun afternoon.