Eric Hartline-Imagn Images
Don’t look now, but the Los Angeles Kings are quietly moving up the ranks of the Pacific Division and the Western Conference in general. The Kings got an overtime/shootout standings point Saturday in a 3-2 overtime loss to the Nashville Predators, and they’re now only four points behind the Vegas Golden Knights for the top spot in the Pacific.
L.A. has gone 8-1-2 in their past 11 games, And their home record of 10-2-1 is one of the best in the NHL. The Kings have much to be excited about, and things could soon get even better.
To wit: star defenseman Drew Doughty is still out of the lineup and listed as month to month. Doughty suffered a fractured ankle in late September, but healthy Kings defensemen have stepped up in his absence, and L.A. is now the NHL’s third-best team defensively with a 2.55 goals-against average. And when Doughty does return, the Kings are going to be markedly better.
That’s terrific work by L.A. GM Rob Blake, who has crafted a deeper Kings squad. And then there’s Kings coach Jim Hiller, who probably doesn’t get enough credit for doing what he’s done with this Los Angeles team. But if he keeps this up, Hiller should get a good deal of support when it comes to the Jack Adams Award as the NHL’s top coach. (There will be other Jack Adams contenders, of course, but Hiller has already steered the Kings into relevancy, and he’s got L.A. off to a strong start through the first third of the season.)
To be frank – after a couple years of believing in the Kings, we shifted to “show me, don’t tell me” mode with this organization. But L.A. has displayed that they can beat just about anyone. They’ve been victorious over Minnesota, Dallas, Ottawa and Winnipeg in the past month or so, and they’ve handled their business with wins against lesser-than teams including Anaheim, Philadelphia, the New York Islanders and the New York Rangers. More importantly, they haven’t lost two games or more in a row since Nov. 11-13 – and even then, they only lost two games in a row in that short span.
The Kings are still a mixed-bag kind of team – their power play is 28th-overall in the league at 14.9 percent efficiency, but their penalty-kill is eighth-overall at 82.5 percent. Their goaltending is also a mixed bag, with starter Darcy Kuemper (2.40 goals-against average, .911 save percentage) and backup David Rittich (.890 SP and 10-7-0 record) sharing the netminding duties.
Los Angeles may not have the generational talent teams build around, but with stars including Quinton Byfield, Adrian Kempe, Kevin Fiala and captain Anze Kopitar — the latter of who is on a better-than-point-per-game pace (27 assists and 37 points in 33 games) — the Kings have sufficient talent to at the very least be a playoff team if not a Stanley Cup front-runner. And somehow, this Kings team has shown itself to be greater than the sum of its parts.
In a relatively easier Pacific Division, L.A. has a terrific opportunity to lock up home-ice advantage in next spring’s Stanley Cup playoffs. The Kings are finding ways to win, and sooner than later, people are going to have the Kings on their radar. And when that spotlight hits the Kings, it will be intriguing to see how they handle the pressure.
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