With about a month until the Stanley Cup Playoffs start, it’s getting to that point of the season when games become more important for different reasons, and teams are scoreboard-watching to see how it affects them in the standings. The wildcard races in both conferences look like they will be going down to the wire, making this final stretch of the season all the more interesting.
While they haven’t officially clinched a playoff spot yet, the Los Angeles Kings are pretty much a lock to make their fourth straight post-season appearance as they sit in third place in the Pacific Division with 83 points. The Kings won’t be stressing out about securing a playoff spot over their remaining 15 games but they will be playing meaningful hockey for other reasons.
Home ice in the first round is up for grabs and with how the playoff matchups are shaping up to be, it looks like the Kings will be faced with the Edmonton Oilers for the fourth straight year. Considering the Kings are the best team in the NHL on home ice, having that advantage over the Oilers for the first time is a good first step in the hopes of “slaying the dragon.” Although home-ice advantage would be huge, avoiding the Oilers in the first round is the best-case scenario for the Kings and there is a decent chance of that happening. First place in the Pacific Division is a wide-open race between the Kings, Oilers, and Vegas Golden Knights, with only five points separating the Kings and Golden Knights and the Kings having a game in hand.
Right before the Trade Deadline, the Kings had lost five straight games, their longest skid of the season. Goal-scoring woes mixed with a drop in their defensive play caused everything to fall apart for a short while. Since the Trade Deadline, though, the Kings are 6-1-0 and have been doing what they can to try and climb up the standings and secure home-ice advantage. The question is, what has contributed to this hot streak?
Kings Icing “Dream Lineup”
The Kings didn’t have a busy trade deadline, something that has been a common theme during general manager Rob Blake’s tenure, but they did add one piece that resulted in a long-awaited shakeup to the lineup. The Kings targeted one of their needs with a low-risk move, acquiring right-shot forward Andrei Kuzmenko from the Philadelphia Flyers.
While there was hope he could find his rookie season form and be a direct contributor to the goal-scoring, the expectation for Kuzmenko wasn’t that big. Through seven games in a Kings sweater, Kuzmenko hasn’t directly made a substantial impact offensively but it hasn’t been due to poor performances or a lack of effort. It’s honestly shocking that he has yet to register his first point as a King. The chances have been there and you could say puck luck hasn’t exactly been in his favour either.
Indirectly, Kuzmenko’s addition made a big impact for the better. With him in, it meant that there was one less forward spot on the roster. This forced head coach Jim Hiller’s hand to finally make 38-year-old Trevor Lewis a healthy scratch. The addition of Kuzmenko and Samuel Helenius and the subtraction of Lewis and Akil Thomas, has created the “dream” lineup that fans have been wishing for the entire season. All four forward lines were full, meaning the Kings could confidently go back to icing 12 forwards and six defensemen. What made this “new” lineup even more exciting was that both Jordan Spence and Brandt Clarke were in, which surprisingly wasn’t happening a whole lot before the deadline.
The Kings have been running with the same lineup since the deadline and for the first time this season, they are consistently rolling the same four full lines and defensive pairings. Helenius has taken over the fourth-line center role and is playing alongside Tanner Jeannot and Alex Turcotte. The new and improved fourth line brings more speed than before, along with that heavy forechecking from both Jeannot and Helenius. Having Turcotte complement those two gives them that extra bit of offensive touch and creativity that was missing when Lewis and Thomas were playing. Through these seven games with the three of them together, we are seeing their importance and reliability with how much time they spend in the offensive zone, wearing down the opposition with their cycle. Not only does going 12/6 allow for a full fourth line, but it creates steady lines and allows players to build chemistry with their linemates and learn each other’s tendencies, which is going to be big come playoff time.
Related Link: Grading the Kings’ Trade for Andrei Kuzmenko
Speaking of building chemistry, two players who have been playing together for a while now have really taken the reigns for the Kings offensively and have played a big part in the success over the past couple of weeks. Quinton Byfield and Kevin Fiala are supposed to be two of the most lethal and dangerous forwards for the Kings and right now, that’s exactly what they have been. Byfield had scored in six straight games and when he’s confident with the puck on his stick and is ripping pucks instead of thinking twice, this Kings team has a whole other layer offensively. Both Byfield and Fiala are fast, creative, able to distribute, able to finish, and strong at protecting the puck. Both of their games complement each other really well and when you add in a player like Alex Laferriere who is defensively responsible, is willing to forecheck hard, and battle in the corners to retrieve a puck, a dominant trio that can thrive on both sides of the puck is what you get.
While the Byfield line has been terrific, it’s been the line of Trevor Moore, Phillip Danault, and Warren Foegele that has stood out, especially when taking a look at the numbers. They lead all Kings forward lines in Corsi share, goals for, goal share, expected goals for, scoring chances, and high-danger scoring chances. When it comes to creating offense, these three have flourished over the past seven games. Moore, who was struggling in a lot of areas for the first half of the season, seems to have found his spark again and it’s visible in his work ethic, positioning on the ice, and most importantly, that lethal release of his that has resulted in eight goals in his last 18 games. A reminder that he only has 14 goals on the season. Foegele continues to be a workhorse and one of the greatest signings in the offseason. His contributions to the offense have been more than what was expected of him and as a result, he is only one goal away from tying his career-high of 20 goals in a season.
Offensive production and goal scoring have been the areas that the Kings struggle with the most, but because of how defensively sound they are, it’s not detrimental a majority of the time. Regardless, relying on that defensive structure can’t be the only way this team can win games. Even though there hasn’t necessarily been a major uptick in goal scoring over the past seven games, this group is getting more creative offensively and they are finding different ways to try and generate goals instead of force-feeding everything from the point. Byfield and Moore are finally utilizing their shots, forwards are using their speed to their advantage by driving to the net off the rush, they are using the space behind the net to cycle to try and open up something in the slot, and they are playing more direct, with a focus on getting pucks to the net from all areas in the offensive zone.
It would be a crime not to mention how important of a role goaltender Darcy Kuemper has played in the Kings’ success this season, but even more so in his continued consistency. I can’t remember a game where Kuemper played bad enough that he didn’t give the Kings a chance to win. It seems like every single night, no matter what, Kuemper is ready to go. His numbers have been terrific all season long but they have been absolutely exceptional post-trade deadline.
Since the deadline, Kuemper has played six games. Out of those six games, he has won five of them. The most goals he allowed in a game was two and his lowest save percentage (SV%) was a .905. Through those six games, Kuemper faced 137 shots and stopped 132 of them for a .964 SV% and a goals-against average (GAA) of less than one (0.83). He only allowed five goals against (three of them came on the penalty kill) but his expected goals against was 13.8. Kuemper faced 34 high-danger shots and stopped 33 of them. These are insane stats, and even though this is just a small sample size, Kuemper’s play hasn’t dipped one bit. To say this is a bounce-back year for Kuemper would be an understatement. If this is the type of goaltending he gives the Kings in the playoffs, he could be the X-factor that they were missing the last three seasons that could finally push them into the second round.
Everything seems to be clicking right now for the Kings except for their atrocious power play, which we will dive into another day. Even though we aren’t getting full 60-minute, flawless performances, the important part is that they are finding ways to get the job done and continuing to pick up these crucial points as we get closer and closer to the post-season.
On March 7, the Kings had just lost their fifth straight game a couple of nights ago and saw their comfortable grip on third place in the Pacific Division slowly loosening as the Vancouver Canucks closed the gap to two points and the Calgary Flames closed the gap to three points. Fast forward 15 days and the Kings now have a seven-point lead over the Canucks with two games in hand and an eight-point lead over the Flames with one game in hand. On March 7, the Kings were five points behind the Oilers for second in the division and now they are just two points back with two games in hand.
The Kings flipped the script quickly and now with the points they have strung together over the past couple of weeks, they are no longer worried about dropping in the standings but instead, how much higher they can climb before the season is out.
