LOS ANGELES – The third leg of the Freeway Faceoff between the Los Angeles Kings and the Anaheim Ducks came to pass on Saturday night and for the third consecutive time it went to overtime.
Jakob Silfverberg scored the only goal in the shootout and Frederik Andersen saved all three of the Kings shots to spoil the party 3-2 for the standing room only crowd at Staples Center.
“I’ve been taking a lot of shootouts so far this year and have been lucky enough to put a lot of them in,” said Silfverberg about his shootout success this season. “It’s a lot about confidence going in there and I feel like I have the confidence with me now.”
The night was dedicated to former Kings defenseman and current assistant General Manager, Rob Blake, who was present for an emotional pregame jersey retirement ceremony as both Southern California teams watched his No. 4 jersey get raised to the rafters.
Blake was drafted by the Kings in 1988 and was the team’s captain for six of his 14 seasons in silver and black. He retired in 2009-2010 as the Kings all-time leader in goals and assists by a defenseman and was inducted last fall into the Hockey Hall of fame. During his first stint with Los Angeles, Blake played alongside NHL legends Wayne Gretzky and Luc Robitaille, followed by Anze Kopitar, Jonathan Quick and Dustin Brown in his second stint.
With Blake and over 40 LA Kings alumni in attendance, the defending Stanley Cup Champions put together one of their best efforts of the season against the Western Conference’s top team.
“We played a pretty good hockey game, but we need to close it out coming into the third period,” said Kings forward Marian Gaborik. “Obviously the shootout has been an issue for the whole year. The points are getting away from us in the shootout, so we just need to find a way to put some goals in.”
After a scoreless first period, Alec Martinez found the net for his 5th goal of the season for Los Angeles to open the second period. Ryan Getzlaf evened the score for Anaheim minutes later before Kopitar scored the go-ahead goal at the end of the period.
“Some guys didn’t even know there was a puck out there,” said Getzlaf about the physical play of the two teams. “Both teams responded well. They were hitting good, clean body checks that were hard. It was good.” Young defenseman, Sami Vatanen, who is widely considered to be the best scoring player at his position in the NHL, scored on a power-play goal midway through the third period to tie the score 2-2.
Jonathan Quick returned to the starting lineup and made 29 saves as the Kings lost for the fifth time in their last six games and have dropped 11 of 13 extra time games this season. In fact, their shootout success is so low; the Kings haven’t found the net in their last 22 shootout attempts.
“We just can’t pick the right guys,” said Kings head coach Darryl Sutter after the game. “We chose Jeff [Carter], Kopi [Kopitar] and Gabi [Gaborik]. If you were betting on the game in shootouts wouldn’t you choose Jeff, Kopi and Gabi?”
Anaheim wins their fourth consecutive game and six of seven games overall. They move into sole possession of the NHL lead after Nashville lost to Detroit earlier in the day.
Kings rookie, Nick Shore, made his NHL debut with the team after he was called up from the AHL earlier in the day. Shore was immediately thrown into a hot contested rivalry that has seen all three games this season go to extra time. The Kings have the trump card in the rivalry however after defeating the Ducks in a spectacular seven-game series during the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs last year.
Game Notes:
The Kings all wore Rob Blake jerseys during warm-ups and played with a Rob Blake #4 patch during the game. Backup goalie, Martin Jones, was ruled out before the game with back spasms and forward Tyler Toffoli missed his fourth straight game with mono.
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