FINAL – Kings 6, Kraken 5 – Turcotte, Helenius, Hiller

The LA Kings tied a franchise record for most wins and points in a single season as they defeated the Seattle Kraken by a 6-5 final score on Tuesday evening at Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle.

More than 15 minutes into the opening period, the Kings got on the board through forward Samuel Helenius. The defensive pairing of Vladislav Gavrikov and Jordan Spence played the role of facilitators, with the former feeding a pass towards the net in transition and Helenius getting a redirection on the way through, re-routing the puck past Seattle netminder Joey Daccord for his third goal of the season.

Just over a minute after the game-opening goal, forward Alex Turcotte made it 2-0 with a power-play goal. Good puck movement fed the puck to forward Adrian Kempe at the center point, where he assisted on two goals in last night’s win. Kempe moved towards the net before he fed Turcotte at the back post for a slam-dunk goal, his ninth of the season, putting the visitors ahead by a pair through 20 minutes of play.

Early in the second period, Seattle got on the board with a shorthanded goal from forward Tye Kartye. With the puck coming around the wall, Kartye chipped the puck off the boards and out of the zone, working his way down the right-hand wing on a breakaway. Kartye picked his spot and beat Kings netminder David Rittich on the glove side for his sixth goal of the season and a 2-1 score.

Skating on a power play of their own, Seattle tied the game midway through the second period. Forward Andre Burakovsky, stationed at the top of the right circle, fed defenseman Brandon Montour at the center point, where he hammered a one-timer through traffic and in for his 18th goal of the season and a tie game. With the goal, Montour moved into fourth in the NHL this season in goals by defensemen.

With just inside four minutes to play in the second period, the Kings pulled back ahead through forward Warren Foegele, who scored his 24th goal of the season for a 3-2 advantage. Forward Phillip Danault made an elusive move at the left point before he worked the puck down the wall to Foegele behid the net. Foegele took the puck on his backhand, went to the slot with purpose and scored, putting the visitors back on top.

72 seconds after Foegele scored, forward Alex Laferriere extended the Los Angeles lead back to two goals. After Daccord made the first save on forward Kevin Fiala off the rush, Laferriere stuck with the play, drove into the crease and buried the rebound for his 19th goal of the season and a 4-2 advantage for the Kings.

Inside the first two minutes of the third period, the Kings increased their lead to three goals, with Kempe hitting the 35-goal mark in the process for the second time in his NHL career. Turcotte returned the favor from his power-play goal earlier with a terrific pass, as Kempe finished at the back post to tie forward Kevin Fiala for the team lead through 81 games of hockey this season.

Less than a minute later, Helenius found the back of the net again to record his first career multipoint game. Defenseman Jacob Moverare put a shot towards the net from the center point that was blocked on the way through, but the puck kicked to Helenius at the back post, to the right of Daccord, and buried his second goal of the night and fourth goal of the season, putting the visitors on top 6-2.

The Kraken pulled a goal back just over five minutes into the third period, with forward Jaden Schwartz scoring his 26th goal of the season, bringing the hosts back to within three goals. On the play, defenseman Ville Ottavainen collected the secondary assist, his first career NHL point, coming in his NHL debut.

Seattle scored twice late, both on the power play, to make it a 6-5 game. First, they scored with just over six minutes to play in regulation. Forward Matty Beiners, at the back post, buried a feed from forward Jordan Eberle for his 20th goal of the season, his second-career 20-goal season, making it a 6-4 game. Then, with 30 seconds remaining, forward Eeli Tolvanen made it a 6-5 game, skating 6-on-4, though the Kraken would pull no closer.

Hear from Helenius, Turcotte and Head Coach Jim Hiller following tonight’s win.

Samuel Helenius

Alex Turcotte
On being bumped up to center the top line tonight
Yeah, I was pretty pumped to play with those guys, they’re great players and to be at center. It definitely took me a little bit to get acclimated out there, it felt like, but it was nice being out there with them. I thought we made a lot of plays, that was a lot of fun.

On Adrian Kempe’s goal and the connection between he, Kempe and Andrei Kuzmenko on the play
Kuz was just holding on to the puck, felt like an eternity, but he has so much patience. I was just trying to find a soft spot and I wasn’t sure if he was going to give it to me, but he had a lot of patience. Found me and I was ready to shoot it, and then I just saw his Juice pop out last second and I just went with my instincts.

On an elevated role serving as motivation in these final games, with home-ice secured
I wanted to take advantage of the opportunity. I was definitely a little nervous before the game, more so than others this year, I would say, but I think it got me in the right mindset to play my game, do my best out there and not take it for granted.

On if hitting 10 goals on Thursday would mean anything to him personally
I think that would be be cool, but I’m trying not to think too much about it, I guess. Obviously 10 is a lot better than nine, so I’m going to try met best.

On seeing his regular linemate, Samuel Helenius, score twice tonight
Oh yeah, that was awesome. I was hoping he was going to get the hat trick, obviously, but yeah, he played great. He’s a great guy, great teammate and to see him get two, it was awesome to see.

Jim Hiller
On seeing Turcotte and Helenius step up with two points each tonight
That was great and we needed it. You know, this was as tough as a back to back I think I’ve had since I’ve been in the league. You guys travel too, it’s a late night, a lot of hockey, a lot of emotion in Edmonton, so we needed something. Those two guys gave us a real good spark, it was good to see.

On what he liked from the team in getting the win on the road
I will tell you what I like, I like the win. This, again, this was a hard back to back. We had some key players out of the lineup. It didn’t mean anything for us in the standings as far as movement and we won the hockey game. That’s what I liked.

On his assessment of Alex Laferriere in his first game at center
Tough night to evaluate and a tough night to evaluate that specifically. I think Laf is one of those players who is pretty versatile, so I don’t think he looked at a place there at all, let’s put it that way, but a hard night, just based on the energy levels and all that kind of stuff.

On the Kings tying a franchise record for wins (48) and points (105) in a single season
It is for sure, we should all be proud of that. That’s good to hear. Yeah, that’s good. I mean, that obviously is not the ultimate, but the players, the fans, the whole franchise, top to bottom, should be proud of that. Not an easy thing to do. When was the last time? [1974-75]. Well, that tells you how easy that is.

On winning twice on the road over the last 48 hours, heading into the playoffs
Yeah, you guys can stop asking about it, I think that’s the most important thing……I like the fact that we’re not going to talk about that for a while. We scored some goals, right? I think we are scoring goals. During the stretch of time where we didn’t win on the road, we were supporting like zero, one, maybe two goals. Now, we’re scoring and it’s funny how it works, you just start to win some games.

Hiller declined to comment on the one-game suspension issued to Edmonton defenseman Darnell Nurse, who cross-checked Kings forward Quinton Byfield in the back of the head during yesterday’s Kings victory. Hiller confirmed pre-game that Byfield would not play tonight, but did not offer an additional update on his status.

Notes –
• Rookie forward Samuel Helenius (2-0=2) scored his third and fourth career goals, recording the first multi-goal and multi-point game of his career in the Kings’ final road contest of the 2024-25 regular season.
• Forward Alex Turcotte (1-1=2) scored his first power play goal of the season, his ninth tally of the year overall, before adding his 16th helper in his third multi-point effort of the campaign.
• Winger Warren Foegele (1-0=1) increased his career-high in goals this season with his 24th of the year, the third most tallies in a skaters’ debut season with the Kings over the past 20 years.
• Forward Alex Laferriere (1-0=1) scored his 19th goal of the season and now has seven points in his last six appearances, dating back to April 5 against Edmonton.
• Forward Adrian Kempe (1-1=2) scored his 35th goal and recorded his 38th assist of the season and now has seven helpers and nine points (2-7=9) over his last four consecutive appearances, dating back to April 10 vs. Anaheim.
• With his pair of points tonight, Kempe became the 14th player in franchise history to record 400 points (194-207=401) with the Kings and just the third active skater to do so, following Anze Kopitar (440-838=1,278) and Drew Doughty (160-526=686).
• Winger Kevin Fiala (0-2=2) notched his 24th assist of the campaign for his 25th power play point of the year (14-11=25), the most among all Kings skaters. In the second period, the Swiss forward added his 25th helper of the year to register his fourth consecutive multi-point game (5-3=8), dating back to April 10 against Anaheim.
• After scoring last night in Edmonton, defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov (0-2=2) recorded his 29th and 30th points of the season (5-25=30) clinches his second career 30-point campaign (5-28=33 in 2021-22 with CBJ).
• Defenseman Jordan Spence (0-1=1) picked up his 23rd assist of the season on Helenius’ game-opener.
• Center Phillip Danault (0-1=1) collected his 35th helper of the year by assisting on a Warren Foegele tally for the second time in a 24 hour span. The assist marked Danault’s 153rd even-strength point (61-92=153) to pass Jari Kurri (57-95=152) for the 33rd most even-strength points in Kings history.
• Forward Jeff Malott (0-1=1) tallied his first career point with an assist in his 12th career NHL game.
• Forward Andrei Kuzmenko (0-1=1) notched his 26th helper of the season and now has nine points (4-5=9) in as many career meetings with the Seattle
Kraken. The winger has a total of 13 points (3-10=13) in his last nine games played, dating back to March 30 against San Jose
• Defenseman Jacob Moverare (0-1=1) picked up his seventh assist of the season, while Trevor Lewis (0-1=1) posted his sixth helper of the campaign on
Helenius’ second tally of the evening.
• Goaltender David Rittich turned aside 29 of Seattle’s shots 34 on goal to improve his record to 16-13-2 on the campaign.
• Early in the opening frame, Rittich denied Chandler Stephenson on a penalty shot, his fourth save on his sixth attempt faced. Earlier this season, the Czech netminder stopped his first penalty shot attempt faced in a Kings uniform against Jets forward Rasmus Kupari on Nov. 27 against Winnipeg.
• With tonight’s victory, the Kings improved their record to 48-24-9, tied for the most wins in a season in franchise history with the 2015-16 Kings, who posted a record of 48-28-6.

The Kings will not practice tomorrow and will return to the ice on Thursday, April 17 for morning skate in advance of that evening’s game versus the Calgary Flames.