It’s hard to imagine the morale of the Los Angeles Kings after a brutal loss like that one. It hasn’t been a particularly promising season so far for a Kings team that has been met with a ton of adversity and the inability to really progress at all, but to lose to one of the best teams in the league (while being shorthanded), not because the Dallas Stars were the better team, but perhaps because the hockey gods gave them a little extra push, just adds another layer of frustration to a struggling season.
A Loss That Stings
There haven’t been many times this season where you could blame the Kings’ struggles on bad luck or bad bounces, but in a 3-1 loss to the Stars at home last night, you could truly say they deserved a better fate.
“That was super frustrating,” Drew Doughty said postgame. “We played a really good game. Unfortunately, just a bad bounce at the end…I thought we deserved better, but at the same time, you got to get more than one goal.”
The recurring theme of the 2025-26 Kings was mentioned again. Once again, they suppressed almost everything the Stars tried to create, only allowing nine shots against through two periods of play, but the need to find ways to put the puck in the net is still looming over this group. There’s definitely been a noticeable uptick in goals scored for the Kings as of late, and it’s an area that has seen some subtle progression over the past handful of games, but against the Stars, the inability to score goals wasn’t due to a lack of effort.
Minus the opening frame that quite literally saw nothing happen for both sides besides another Adrian Kempe turnover, which led to Wyatt Johnston scoring on the Stars’ first shot of the game, the Kings were the dominant team. They controlled most of the play, spending significant amounts of time in the offensive zone and on the cycle trying to open up plays that could lead to high-danger chances in front of the net.
A lot of that dominant play in the offensive zone was courtesy of a line that has continuously brought good performances since being formed. Kevin Fiala was all over the ice and looked dominant with the puck in the offensive zone. Complemented well by both Alex Turcotte and Andrei Kuzmenko, that trio has been the Kings’ driving force offensively since their creation. Leading all forward lines in shots for percentage and scoring chances for percentage, those three desperately tried to get something going offensively.
It’s not often a play doesn’t die at the hands of a Kings defenseman other than Brandt Clarke on the blue line, but that’s the way this roster has been constructed. There have been too many instances where the Kings’ forwards will set up an opportunity at the point just for the puck to either end up being blocked or bobbled. It’s a lot harder to score goals when there’s a clear lack of offensive capability throughout the Kings’ back end and the inability to provide much support in getting pucks to high-danger areas.
Clarke is only one player, and we saw what can happen when there’s a defenseman who can perform in an offensive scenario on the point. It was Clarke’s keep at the blue line on the power play before he managed to thread a puck through to a wide-open Corey Perry, who fed Quinton Byfield a freebie for his 500th career assist, which led to the Kings finally breaking through and tying the game at one.
“Oh, he’s a tremendous skater. He’s got that offensive instinct, and he’s going to be a good player in this league for a long time. He’s just getting better each and every game,” Perry said of the offensively gifted defenseman.
A lot would be different if the Kings had more offensive skill throughout their defensive group.
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Turnovers kill, and in a game where goals were hard to come by for the Kings, the last thing they needed were self-inflicted mistakes. Kempe’s turnover led to the Stars’ opening goal, and Doughty’s turnover late in the third gave Mikko Rantanen a prime scoring opportunity right in the slot. Perhaps it was the only bit of luck the Kings received all game, as the goal was called back for offside after they challenged the play, but it was all for nothing. Jason Robertson’s floater of a shot on the backhand from just inside the blue line bounced off of Mikey Anderson’s pants and past Darcy Kuemper for the go-ahead goal with less than four minutes remaining.
Add unfortunate bounces to the list of struggles the Kings have been dealing with this season, because there have been more than a couple over the past few games that have killed them. They didn’t play all that well in that blowout loss in Winnipeg last Friday, but three of the Jets’ five goals were unlucky bounces that found their way to the net.
Despite the continuous push from the Kings in the second and third periods against the Stars, a weak flutter-puck decided their fate. The effort was there, the result wasn’t, and unfortunately for the Kings, where they are right now in the standings, results are the only thing that matters.
“Bottom line is we need to get wins, and unfortunately, we didn’t get this one, but we can definitely look at a lot of positive things on what we did tonight,” Doughty said.
Right now, the Kings are desperate for points. They are desperate to keep up in the standings, and they have a huge opportunity to inject some life into their playoff hopes with three huge games against Pacific Division rivals up next. The Kings have what it takes to beat the Vegas Golden Knights and lay it down on a struggling Anaheim Ducks squad. They can win hard-fought games from time to time; the one thing that’s been missing is consistency, and unfortunately, that’s the most important element they need to find right now.
