Williams: `Discouraging, but not discouraged’

After practice today, Justin Williams spoke at length about the Kings’ offensive struggles, what they’re working on, the teams’ mindset and what it will take to get things turned around…

WILLIAMS: “We’re trying to find a way to be more creative out there, to get our defensemen more involved. It’s just the way teams play (defensively) right now. It’s five guys down real low, and when we don’t use our defensemen, it’s kind of like playing 3-on-5 down there, and that’s tough. So we’re trying to get them more involved and be a little more imaginative. It’s discouraging, but we can’t get discouraged. That’s one thing that we’re not going to do. We’re going to push through and work harder and not let it get like last year, where we lost seven in a row. We’re going to right it right away, and we’re due for a big one.

“We’ll get it. You look at the teams in the league, and I’m pretty sure we’re pretty low in goals-against also. We don’t play the type of game where we’re going to win 6-5, 7-6. That’s not the way we’re built and that’s not the way our system is. Come playoff time, we win by playing our system and playing good defensively. … We’ll be fine. As I said, it’s discouraging but we can’t be discouraged. We need to push forward and realize that second and third opportunities are the ones that are going to be good for us right now, just to get a lot of guys (going) who are struggling to score, but I guess that’s everybody. We just want guys feeling good about themselves, and getting into their heads the ability to make plays.’’

Question: Working on a few battle drills there in practice, down low…

WILLIAMS: “It’s just overall. Obviously last night was just — let me think of a nice word — it just simply wasn’t good enough offensively. We were pushed off pucks. As I said, second and third opportunities are the ones, rebounds, getting pucks back after they think they have possession of them in the defensive zone, turning pucks over. That’s when you create, and when you get discouraged you don’t work as hard to get those chances. When they get the puck, you can’t put your head down and say, `Oh, they’re going to get out of the zone.’ Get after it and turn it over, and that’s where you create goals.’’