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Recap: Points in 6 straight in stinging OT loss to Blue Jackets

Going into the Game

  • This was a matchup of a couple teams who came in having earned points in each of their last five games.  The Los Angeles Kings are 4-0-1, while the Columbus Blue Jackets are 3-0-2.
  • Jack Campbell draws the start for the Kings, while Joonas Korpisalo is in net for the Blue Jackets.
  • There was some concern that Dustin Brown would miss the game, having been under the weather.  Yet, he is in the game.
  • With Jeff Carter the ex-Columbus Blue Jacket in the game, the Columbus crowd is sure to give him a warm reception of boos.
  • The Kings are hoping they don’t hear the cannon blast, sounded for every goal the Blue Jackets score, too much.  That sound is loud enough to wake up both Union and Confederate soldiers./

Game Time

The Kings wasted little time in breaking the ice.  In fact, Adrian Kempe’s sixth goal of the season was the fastest scored into a game for the season at 42 seconds into the first period:

The Columbus Blue Jackets tied the score on the power play slightly over two minutes after with the Kings’ Kurtis MacDermid in the box.  Columbus’ Zach Werenski’s shot from the point eluded Jack Campbell.  For the rest of the first period, both teams played it very evenly, with neither really dominating play.

The even play between the two teams continued well into the second period.  Neither team was able to take advantage of the power plays given in that period (a delay of game penalty on the Blue Jackets’ Seth Jones, and a pair of hooking calls for the Kings’ Sean Walker).  Fortunately for the Kings, they didn’t hear the cannon go boom.  Instead, they heard the Columbus crowd go “boooo!”, as their former player, Jeff Carter cashed in on a turnaround shot in the slot off of a dump-in play:

Against his former team, Jeff Carter has scored 14 goals in 21 career games against Columbus.

In spite of the grinding, and lack of dangerous chances, the Columbus Blue Jackets wound up finishing the second period with a 13-5 shots on goal advantage.

As the third period continued, the grind it out game continued as both teams struggled to gain clean zone entries into their attacking zones.  Both relied on the dump and chase game to create scoring chances.  While the Kings were nursing a 2-1 lead, their strong defensive structure looked like it would hold up long enough to win the game in regulation.

That didn’t turn out to be the case.  Throughout the season in general, the Los Angeles Kings have been a solid faceoff team.  Coming into the game, Anze Kopitar was at 57.9% in faceoff percentage, with Jeff Carter not too shabby at 50.9%.  Most games, the Kings finish with a faceoff percentage at least slightly above 50%.  However, they were particularly sub par tonight, finishing at 42.9%.  The low percentage contributed to their collapse late in regulation.  The Kings faceoff losses late in the game, exacerbated by the icings they were taking, kept them hemmed in their defensive zone.  Off of yet another faceoff loss for Los Angeles, the Blue Jackets tied it late, off a deflection from Boone Jenner with the Koripsalo pulled for the extra attacker:

Once overtime started, Los Angeles was never able to find any seams or matchups to take advantage to generate any scoring chances against Columbus.  From there, it wasn’t long before Columbus’ Gustav Nyquist found a streaking Pierre-Luc Dubois for the game winner in overtime:

Los Angeles can take solace that they still earned a point, six consecutive games with at least a point earned in the standings, 10 points out of a possible 12 in those games.  This one probably should have been two, but give credit to the Columbus Blue Jackets for dominating possession late.

Up Next

Kings conclude the road trip against the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday at a time more appropriate for an omelette over wings, 10 AM, PST.

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