In a year where seventh round draft picks have been a central theme to Kings related news — from the organization parting ways with Matt Roy to Andre Lee making the opening night roster, and from Aatu Jamsen coming over from Finland to Kaleb Lawrence turning pro — it was another late round selection who did the team in on Tuesday night. Flames goaltender Dustin Wolf, who was selected 214th out of 217 total players taken at the 2019 NHL Draft, stopped 29 of LA’s 30 shots en route to a 3-1 victory for Calgary.
After quietly putting up five points (1G, 4A) last week, Trevor Moore extended his point streak to a career-long sixth game with his third goal of the season. However, it was largely too late at that point, as the marker came with less than three minutes remaining in regulation.
LA lost the faceoff battle on the night, only winning 21-of-46 (46%) draws. More often than not this season, a game featuring a less than 50% success rate at the faceoff dot leads to earning less than two points. On the positive side, coach Jim Hiller saw his penalty kill go a perfect 2-for-2.
LA goaltender Darcy Kuemper has now lost two straight games in regulation after opening the season 4-0-3.
Lineup Notes: Sammy Helenius had his first NHL fight in his second game up with the Kings. That now gives LA nine fighting majors on this season, the most fights of any team in the League. He centered the fourth line, with Andre Lee and Akil Thomas as his wingers. Trevor Lewis started the game up top with Anze Kopitar and Adrian Kempe, but Hiller later flipped Lewis and Trevor Moore. Defensively, everything stayed the same as the prior game, including Vladislav Gavrikov anchoring the top pairing alongside Mikey Anderson.
MORE LA KINGS NEWS:
Follow @mayorNHL
Continue reading...
