With three games remaining in the regular season, the Los Angeles Kings are in a position in which they could still finish first in the Pacific Division or miss the playoffs completely.
The Kings (34-26-19, 87 points) will close with a three-game trip, all against foes who have already been eliminated from the race. Following Monday’s stop in Seattle to meet the Kraken, they’ll play Tuesday in Vancouver and Thursday in Calgary.
The Kings — whose 1-0 victory Saturday over Edmonton was their fourth in a row, tying a season high — currently sit in the Western Conference’s second and final wild-card spot, one point ahead of Nashville. They’re also just four points back of division-leading Vegas with a game in hand.
“Going on this road trip, I don’t really remember when was the last time we had a (four)-game winning streak, so it definitely feels good,” said Kings captain Anze Kopitar, who plans to retire at the end of the season. “But more importantly, I think the belief in this locker room has gone up and spiked, which is obviously a very good thing.”
Los Angeles is one of only four teams in the league — Colorado, Dallas and Montreal are the others — with fewer than 10 regulation losses on the road this season (19-9-10).
Artemi Panarin, acquired from the New York Rangers in early February, scored Los Angeles’ lone goal Saturday, and Anton Forsberg made 27 saves for his third shutout of the season.
Panarin’s goal came at 7:34 of the first period, when he stole the puck from Edmonton defenseman Evan Bouchard and scored on a breakaway.
Panarin has nine goals and 17 assists in 23 games with the Kings and a plus/minus rating of plus-10. He was a minus-16 in 52 games for the Rangers.
“I mean, he can make plays, and he makes two or three a night that no one else makes,” Kings interim coach D.J. Smith said. “A lot of the game was just that kind of back and forth, but they made one mistake, give the Bread Man a breakaway and he gets the winner, so we expect a lot from him to get where we want to go, but he found a way to do it here (Saturday).”
Forsberg, who is 4-0-0 with a 0.97 goals-against average and a .963 save percentage in his past four starts, made that hold up.
“Now, obviously, it’s only a few games left,” Forsberg said. “It’s our game, and we just got to play that, and then hopefully it’ll turn out the right way.”
Forsberg got some help from defenseman Cody Ceci, who dove to knock a shot off the goal line after it trickled past the goaltender midway through the first period.
“Every single guy in this locker room is putting team first and the winning mentality first, and we’re trying to win games,” Kopitar said. “Whether that’s 1-0 or 7-6, it doesn’t really matter. It’s about the two points for the next week, and then we’ll go from there.”
The Kraken (34-34-11, 79 points), whose playoff hopes were dashed with Los Angeles’ victory Saturday, went out later that day and defeated Calgary 4-1, as goalie Nikke Kokko made 26 saves to win his first NHL start.
“I feel great,” Kokko said. “I was little bit nervous before (the) game, but when I come to the rink and started doing my routine and warmups, then I enjoyed.”
Kokko got the start with Joey Daccord and Philipp Grubauer both nursing lower-body injuries and Matt Murray away from the team to deal with family matters.
“With Nikke coming in and it being his first NHL start, I thought our guys did a really good job and made a concerted effort to give him as much help as possible,” Kraken coach Lane Lambert said. “And when we needed him, he made some good saves for us.”
–Field Level Media
