Los Angeles Kings Fall to Arizona Coyotes

The Los Angeles Kings lost Saturday night to division rival, the Arizona Coyotes.  The game required overtime to be decided.  Losing in overtime gives the Kings their first point in the standings of the year, while they are still looking for their first win of the season.

Final score in the game was 3-2.  The Kings are now 0-1-1

The Kings started off strong on Saturday night, scoring the first two goals of the game in the first period.  Unfortunately they finished poorly.

A minute and a half into the first period Tanner Pearson scored the Kings first goal of the season.  Kings center Jeff Carter dived to his knees to pick up a loose puck in the Coyotes zone.  He immediately swung a pass over to Tyler Toffoli, who fumbled the puck, that fortoudisouly ended up on the stick of Pearson.  Pearson cut along the bottom of the right circle to the net, and fired a high shot beating Devan Dubnyk.  1-0 Kings.

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The goal was technically unassisted because the fumbled puck from Toffoli to Pearson was touched by Coyotes forward Lauri Korpikoski.

With just over seven minutes left in the first, the other two-thirds of That 70’s line, got on the board.  Slava Voynov threw the puck along the boards out of the Kings zone to center ice.  As the puck crossed the Coyotes blue line, Coyotes defensemen Michael Stone lost the puck to Tyler Toffoli, who passed the puck to Jeff Carter as he entered the zone.  Carter skated into the high slot and put a shot on net.  Dubnyk got a piece of the puck but it trickled in.  2-0 Kings.

The game took a bad turn right before the end of the period.  A hooking penalty by Pearson put the Coyotes on the power-play.  After the initial save by Kings goaltender Jonathan Quick, defensemen Matt Greene made an attempt to clear the puck down the center of the ice.  Greene’s attempt failed as his shot was gloved down by Coyotes defensemen Keith Yandle who immediately fired a shot on goal.  Yandle’s shot was tipped in the slot by Antoine Vermette.  2-1 Kings.

Halfway through the second period the Kings were in the midst of a line-change captain Dustin Brown failed to get the puck deep into the Coyotes zone.  Stone caused Brown to turn the puck over, moved the puck back to Yandle in the Coyotes zone, and Yandle fired a pass right through the center of the ice to a Mikkel Boedker.  The lead pass from Yandle put Boedker on a breakaway, and Boedker was able to beat Quick off the near post.  2-2 tie game.

No goals in the third period led to overtime.

At the tail end of the overtime period Toffoli was in the box for a hooking penalty.  In the Kings zone, Coyotes defensemen Oliver Ekman-Larsson picked the puck up off the boards and passed it down low, below the goal-line to Vermette.  Vermette passed it back to Ekman-Larsson who moved to the center of the ice, and out toward the point.  Ekman-Larsson picked his spot and fired a shot through a screen and past Quick, for a Coyotes win.

Special teams have been killing the Kings in their first two games.  Against the Coyotes the Kings were 0-for-5, including an unsuccessful power-play when the Coyotes took a two-minute penalty in the last three minutes of the third period while the game was tied.

The Kings penalty-kill wasn’t much better.  The Coyotes went 2-for-5 on the power-play, including the game-winning overtime goal.  Special teams is an area the Kings will have to improve on if they plan to get back to the top-end of the Pacific Division.

Kings goalie Jonathan Quick faced 40 shots, an unusually high number for the Kings to allow.  Quick save percentage was .925.