LOS ANGELES — The Kings cranked it up in the third period to steal a consolation point at home after rambling listlessly on offense through most of Wednesday night’s 3-2 overtime loss to the Vancouver Canucks at Crypto.com Arena.
They avoided what would have been just their second regulation loss in their past 17 outings on home ice. Vancouver snapped its two-game winless streak and climbed back into a playoff spot in the process.
Trailing 2-0 heading into the third, the Kings got a flashy goal from Adrian Kempe and a blue-collar one from Warren Foegele to force overtime. David Rittich made 14 saves, saddling him with his fifth loss in his past six starts.
Top defenseman Drew Doughty was a late scratch due to a lower-body injury, drawing Kyle Burroughs into the lineup. Doughty is considered “day-to-day” and is expected to travel with the team to Dallas, per Coach Jim Hiller.
Nils Höglander got the ball rolling for Vancouver before Conor Garland scored once in regulation and again in OT to decide the outcome. Filip Chytil chipped in two assists. Kevin Lankinen beat back 24 bids. While the Kings were without their No. 1 blue-liner, Vancouver got theirs back at the last possible instant as Quinn Hughes played 21:38 and contributed an assist on the game-winning strike in his first action since Jan. 31.
“For us to win games, especially in the second half, we have to play a full 60 minutes,” defenseman Jordan Spence said. “If we play like we did in the third period, the result would have been different.”
Hiller didn’t quite concur.
“Even in our third period, I didn’t think we were sharp,” he said. “We scored, that was great to see. We played much better, but I still didn’t think we were sharp.”
In overtime, Drew O’Connor tripped up Kevin Fiala, giving the Kings their second pivotal power play after they failed to cash in one late in regulation. They were again unable to convert, setting the stage for Garland’s second goal with 34 seconds left in the bonus session. Garland skated into Hughes’ pass near the left-wing wall and attacked Brandt Clarke directly before rifling in a shot from the faceoff dot.
With 5:59 to play in regulation, there was a pivotal sequence that first saw the Kings tie the score on Foegele’s redirection of Spence’s shot, and then earn a power play as a result of Vancouver coach Rick Tocchet’s unsuccessful challenge for goalie interference. After Foegele’s 16th goal of the season was upheld, the power play was fruitless, though Spence did swipe Chytil’s shorthanded bid off the goal line to avert calamity.
“The penalty kill was huge. We missed the challenge and then we got a penalty in overtime, so we killed those two penalties off, a lot of guts, I’ve got to give the guys a lot of credit,” Tocchet said.
With 10:44 left in regulation, Kempe received the puck near the red line and propelled forward to deliver a far-side snipe that Lankinen had little chance of stopping. It was the newlywed Kempe’s team-leading 26th goal of the season.
“I got a good pass, I had a lot of speed so I tried to shoot it in stride,” Kempe said. “It definitely builds confidence. I haven’t played my best game over the last couple of games or before the break either, so hopefully that can spark me.”
The middle frame brought more of the same for the Kings, who were again tepid offensively and once more gave up the period’s only goal, a power-play marker at 13:07.
Vancouver forced a defenseman, Mikey Anderson, and a forward, Foegele, to switch positions, and then outnumbered the Kings below the goal line. The result was Chytil’s feed to Garland, who popped the puck in easily from below the hash marks just before taking a hit from Anderson.
“He was a beast tonight,” Hughes said of Garland. “Even in the first period, he was probably our best player: creating chances, [being] competitive, [skating] all over the ice.”
The first period seemed to call for cold medicine, as it was defined by grogginess and congestion. The two teams barely broke double digits in combined shots on goal, but the Canucks got the better of both the shot count and the score.
As the midpoint of the period approached, Vancouver got on the board when former King Derek Forbort set up Höglander’s tally to open the scoring. Joel Edmundson, who was also on for Vancouver’s second goal, had wiped out in the slot. That left Spence alone against Höglander and Kiefer Sherwood, who sprang open at the back post. Höglander elected to keep the puck and placed it so precisely to the far side that Rittich barely reacted to his shot.
Next up, the Kings travel to the Lone Star State for a clash with the Dallas Stars, whom they’ve beaten in both meetings to date this season.
MINOR MOVE
Before the game, the Kings traded minor-league forward Tyler Madden to the Minnesota Wild in exchange for minor-league defenseman Joseph Cecconi.