LOS ANGELES -- On the same night the Los Angeles Kings celebrated the Los Angeles Dodgers’ World Series championship, the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers proved that, even metaphorically, sometimes home runs beat singles.
Although the Kings put up several sustained stretches of pressure and shooting barrages, the Panthers took advantage of good bounces to score several timely quickfire goals, allowing them to both stay in the game and pull away for a 5-2 win.
“The game is a game of mistakes,” Kings head coach Jim Hiller said. “When somebody makes a mistake, then somebody takes advantage of it. And right now, when we’re making a mistake, they’re taking pretty good advantage of it. They made a few mistakes tonight too … We just are not taking advantage of those opportunities in those times.”
The Kings actually got the majority of the scoring chances in the game, thanks in large part to them controlling most of the first period and some of the third period. In the former, they outshot the Panthers 14-8, but the period ended with the score tied at 2-2.
“That's the way it goes,” Kings defenseman Mikey Anderson said. “Sometimes they fall, sometimes they don’t. Right now it seems like maybe they’re not going our way a fair amount, more than they are. But it’s trying to stick with it, stay positive and keep building.”
After the Panthers took the lead in the second period, the Kings opened the third with an aggressive approach but couldn’t score. Florida put in a shorthanded goal to expand their advantage, then put the game away on Brad Marchand’s second of the night.
“We came out with lots of energy in the third period,” Hiller said. “We had three or four good looks around [Panthers goalie Sergei] Bobrovsky. Had a chance to push and then shot ourselves in the foot.”
In spite of their inability to turn their opportunities into results, the Kings remain hopeful that the roll of the puck will turn in their favor soon.
“Obviously, you can’t panic,” Kings forward Trevor Moore said. “We’d like to score more. I’d like to score more. It’s just not happening right now. But we like what we’ve seen in a lot of areas of our game. We don’t want to get away from those.”
At the same time, the Kings are making mistakes that other teams take advantage of, and haven’t returned the favor often enough — which could be creating a gap between their talent and their record.
“I think as of late, at least, it hasn’t been bad games,” Anderson said. “Sometimes you just come up with a bad result. Sometimes it’s little mistakes that lead to goals against. You play high level teams, which we think we are and know we are. That can be the difference. You don’t need much to put it in.”
The Kings conclude their four-game homestand with a 1-2-1 record. They now embark on a six-game road trip which will last nearly two weeks. The trip might be coming at the exact right time, as they won four of five games on their previous road stint.