Things don’t get much better than yesterday for the LA Kings. It’s not very often when every forward in the lineup records a point, but that’s what took place Saturday afternoon at Cyrpto.com Arena — when coach Jim Hiller saw his club put up seven goals against one of the NHL’s top teams. While that was beyond impressive (and appeared to be a lot of fun for the group), it’s right back to business tonight as the Boston Bruins are in town.
Sunday evening features two teams on completely different trajectories during a final push through the 2024-25 regular season. Unfortunately, this season hasn’t gone according to plan for the typically tough Bruins this year; so much so that they moved out their captain at the Trade Deadline. For two decades, the Bruins were a staple in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, but that seems to be coming to an end next month.
All this to say, these two points on the table for Los Angeles today are critical, as their battle for home-ice advantage continues. Both teams played yesterday, so fatigue could become a factor in today’s matchup, especially in the game’s latter stages.
Lineup-wise, the only change expected from Hiller is most likely to be his starting goaltender. LA’s bench boss made a surprising decision yesterday, starting David Rittich against one of the Eastern Conference’s best offerings — leaving his top netminder, Darcy Kuemper, for tonight’s showdown. The front-half of that decision paid dividends in the form of a dominate win over Carolina. We’ll see how his team responds when they take to the ice again 24 hours later.
The real story between the Kings and Bruins is perhaps best saved for the section below.
Statistically Speaking
— Goaltender Darcy Kuemper. holds a 14-1-2 record in Downtown LA this season. He also has a .934 save percentage and 1.69 goals against average in those games. Kuemper is coming in hot today, as he’s over all of his starts in March, he’s posted a record of 5-2-1, along with a .941 SV% and 1.36 GAA.
— This is the Kings fifth game on a Sunday this season. They are 3-1-0 thus far.
— Here is the really interesting stuff. In their last ten contents against Boston, LA is 4-4-2. However, they’ve lost six straight on home ice to Boston. Their last win came on March 19, 2016 in the form of a 2-1 victory, and it’s a game featuring some fascinating NHL history. A guy named Tyler Randell scored for Boston that day. It was his last NHL goal. He only played in the NHL that one season (27 games total), scoring in his first NHL game and his last NHL game. Of the six goals he scored over that very brief stretch, two of them came against the Kings — one in each contest he saw them. Randell also knew several of the Kings players he squared off with during the 2015-16 NHL season, as he played against many of the Kings younger stars in AHL Manchester over three prior seasons while he was with the Providence Bruins.
Kings Projected Lineup vs. Bruins
If there are any key changes during pregame warmups (or Hiller’s pregame press briefing), this article will be updated.
Kuzmenko – Kopitar – Kempe
Foegele – Danault – Moore
Fiala – Byfield – Laferriere
Jeannot – Helenius – Turcotte
Anderson – Doughty
Gavrikov – Spence
Edmundson – Clarke
Kuemper (starter)
Rittich
Likely scratches: (F) Lewis, Thomas and (D) Burroughs, Moverare
Key Game Info
Puck drop is set for 6:00 pm Pacific Time and will be televised locally by FanDuel Sports Network. Additionally, a Kings radio feed is available on the ESPN LA app (which is the new home for Kings radio this season, they’ve moved off of the iHeart platform).
More on the ongoing TV situation here.
For those live in attendance, the LA Kings Booster Club will offer their popular ‘Puck for a Buck’ contest — featuring Brandt Clarke for this game. Just $1 could win you an autographed puck from an NHL star. Visit their table outside sections 317-318 on the upper concourse for more information.
Across the Ice
Boston is coming off a 3-1 loss to San Jose on Saturday. Here is how they lined up for that contest:
Geekie – Zacha – Pastrnak
Koepke – Mittelstadt – Lettieri
Khusnutdinov – Lindholm – Lysell
Beecher – Brown – Lauko
Zadorov – Jokiharju
Lohrei – Peeke
Wotherspoon – Callahan
Korpisalo
On This Day in Kings History
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