ST. PAUL, Minn. — On a night when Darcy Kuemper was not quite as impenetrable as he has been of late, the Kings needed more out of their offense.
Mats Zuccarello scored the tiebreaking power-play goal with 4:38 left and the Minnesota Wild beat the Kings, 3-1, on Monday night, ending the Kings’ five-game winning streak and Kuemper’s shutout streak of 175-plus minutes.
Ryan Hartman had a goal and an assist, Marcus Johansson (empty net) also scored, and Jared Spurgeon had two assists for Minnesota (38-25-5, 81 points), which had lost four of previous five games. Filip Gustavsson finished with 28 saves.
Adrian Kempe scored for the Kings (36-21-9, 81 points), who remained one point behind Edmonton for second place in Pacific Division with a game in hand on the Oilers. Kuemper – coming off shutouts in his previous two starts – had 19 saves.
“We got a little sloppy in the third period,” Kings coach Jim Hiller told NHL.com. “Second period I thought we played really well, a good period, and probably had enough chances to come out with the lead in the third. … Gustavsson played very well, I thought. I don’t know if anybody else saw that. We probably still turned up way too many chances where we had a chance to shoot with traffic. … So, you know, one of those nights where, when we finally put it there, we didn’t get anything. But yeah, it’s a winnable game. It’s a mistake. It’s execution on their side at the end.”
Zuccarello got a pass from Matt Boldy in the left circle, settled the puck and fired it past Kuemper with Marco Rossi screening the goalie to give Minnesota a 2-1 lead. It was hist 100th goal since signing with the Wild in 2019.
Johansson added an empty-netter with 56 seconds left to seal the win.
Both teams relied on the power play to get on the board, and neither team needed much time with the man advantage.
Zuccarello’s 16th goal of the season came just 34 seconds after Trevor Moore was called for a tripping penalty. He scored from the left faceoff circle, beating Keumper on the short side.
Kempe put the Kings on top 4:59 into the opening period, just 17 seconds after Marco Rossi went to the box for slashing Fiala. On the power play, Fiala found a seam through the Wild’s penalty kill unit to feed an open Kempe for his team-best 28th goal of the season.
The power-play goal was just the fourth for the Kings in their last 11 games. However, the visitors, who had converted just three of their last 23 opportunities, squandered their next three power plays.
The Kings had a couple of opportunities to double their lead. Alex Laferriere had four chances in a nine-second span seven minutes after Kempe’s score. Gustavsson stopped three, and Jon Merrill swept the puck off the goal line on the other.
Warren Foegele thought he had scored in the first minute of the second period, but officials immediately waived it off ruling Brandt Clarke took Gustavsson out of the crease.
Hartman tied the score with 18:09 left in the second period, just four seconds after Kings defenseman Drew Doughty went off for cross-checking. Hartman won the ensuing faceoff with the puck going back to Spurgeon, whose point shot was deflected by Hartman in the air past Kuemper. That ended the goaltender’s shutout streak at 176:06.
Gustavsson made a stellar save to snare Doughty’s one timer from center point through traffic 2:05 into the third period to keep the score tied at 1-1.
“I think overall we played a pretty good game,” Kempe told NHL.com. “I think they did as well. I think it was pretty even throughout the game. Not a ton of chances going back and forth. Both teams played solid defensively. At the end of the day, penalties and PK came up short today. It’s been good all year. Tough when you lose in the last minute.”
Minnesota has a firm grip on the first wild-card spot in the Western Conference and pulled four points behind third-place Colorado in the Central Division.
ICE CHIPS
Kings forward Quinton Byfield had his six-game goal streak end. … The Kings dropped to 25-7-4 when scoring first. … The Wild were 2 for 3 on the power play after coming in 2 for 6 over the previous three games.
UP NEXT
The Kings play at Chicago on Thursday at 5:30 p.m. PT to finish a two-game trip.