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The Los Angeles Kings suffered a tough loss against the Toronto Maple Leafs last night, falling 5-0.
It was a really-fast paced start to the game, with both teams having some pretty great chances, just within the first five minutes alone. The Kings were trapped in their end for much of the period after that though and ended up taking some penalties but managed to escape the frame still scoreless, while being outshot 15-7.
Early in the second frame, Blake Lizotte ended up initiating a fight with Zach Aston-Reese, following a high hit on Arthur Kaliyev in open ice. On the ensuing power play though, Pierre Engvall capitalized for Toronto, making a nice move to drag the puck around Matt Roy’s stick and fired a shot past Jonathan Quick. Then only 26 seconds later, the Kings were caught up ice and David Kampf came in on an odd-man rush, beating Quick over the glove to make it a two-goal game. Things only got worse from there, as Alex Edler was caught in the neutral zone and Sean Walker got beaten to a puck to leave William Nylander in alone and he beat Quick as well, for the Leafs’ third goal in just 66 seconds. Then later in the frame, Carl Grundstrom made a sloppy pass to put the puck back into his own end and Mitch Marner just took the bounce off the end boards and one-timed it to beat Quick, making it a 4-0 game.
It did look like the Kings got on the board in the third period to show a bit of life, on a power play following a match penalty for Pierre Engvall, but even that was called back due to an offside. Then midway through the frame, Auston Matthews got on the board after taking a pass in-close, and the Leafs cruised to a 5-0 win from there.
Coming off a good effort on Tuesday, where the Kings put together a well-rounded win over the Ottawa Senators, this couldn’t be much of a worse follow-up performance.
They were completely outplayed in the opening period and were lucky to get out of the frame scoreless, before everything came crashing down in the second frame. Tons of poor decisions, both with players getting caught out of position or just committing some bad turnovers, resulted in a lot of high-danger chances for the Leafs off the rush.
The Kings also had a really tough time even just getting out of their end, frequently spending stretches of time there, losing battles and not being able to get possession. Los Angeles just really didn’t show much fight or get a whole lot going. Quality of competition is obviously a factor, going from Ottawa to Toronto, but the Kings looked incredibly flat.
The good news is, their next three games of the road trip will come against the Montreal Canadiens, Columbus Blue Jackets and Buffalo Sabres. None should be taken lightly, but it’s certainly an opportunity for the Kings to move on after the tough loss and pick up some points.
They’ll be back in action on Saturday, when they face the Canadiens.
OTHER ARTICLES FROM DECEMBER
Kings earn important home win over Coyotes
Kings end homestand with 4-2 loss to Hurricanes
Big first period propels Kings to win over Sens in first game of road trip 
Los Angeles Kings Blogger • 
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