FINAL – Kings 2, Canucks 4 – Edmundson, Foegele, Hiller

The LA Kings saw their four-game point streak come to an end when they dropped a 4-2 decision to the Vancouver Canucks on Thursday night at Crypto.com Arena.

Within the first two minutes of the game, forward Quinton Byfield opened the scoring for the Kings with his second goal in as many periods. Byfield used his speed to take a step down the left wing and worked his way to the net. He backhanded it across the court and beat Vancouver netminder Kevin Lankinen with a shot for his second goal of the season and a 1-0 lead.

Midway through the second period, Kings forward Tanner Jeannot was assessed a game penalty for a hit to the head of Vancouver forward Brock Boeser, giving the Canucks an extended, five-minute power-play sequence.

Vancouver scored just once on the man advantage and took the game into the first intermission at one goal apiece. Forward Conor Garland redirected the puck toward the net, where Kings netminder Darcy Kuemper accidentally swiped it with his stick on the way through, into the net, for Garland’s fourth goal of the season.

Early in the second period, Vancouver took its first lead of the night. Forward Jake DeBrusk was the scorer, using a nice move to go around Kuemper under the goal line before pulling it back and scoring at the near post for a 2-1 lead. Defensemen Quinn Hughes and Filip Hronek collected the assists on the play for the visitors.

Within three minutes played in the third period, Hughes made it a multi-point game when he buried his third goal of the season. Working the blue line at the left point, Hughes used his quick feet and stick handling skills to work his way into some space and sent a glancing shot through traffic that found its way through the body and in as the Canucks took a 3. -1 lead.

With just over six minutes left in regulation, the Kings pulled a goal back through defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov, who buried his first of the season. At the left point, Gavrikov fired a shot that eluded a screen in front from forward Trevor Lewis and snuck inside the post to make it 3-2. Forwards Phillip Danault and Trevor Moore tallied the assists on the game, both extending their assist streaks to three games.

The Canucks took the empty net with 1:14 left on the clock as JT Miller tallied the final goal of the game to make it 4-2.

Hear from defenseman Joel Edmundson, forward Warren Foegele and head coach Jim Hiller after tonight’s game.

Joel Edmundson

Warren Foegele
On his takeaways from tonight’s game
Those were two tough teams that fought pretty hard there. It was a good hockey game and you know we came up just short there, but I thought it was a pretty competitive game. Unfortunately, they won the special teams, and winning hockey games can be a difference maker.

About the physicality of tonight’s match
It was probably a lot closer to a playoff game than most of the other games we’ve had this year, but these are two good teams competing hard for the division. I’m sure we’ll be seeing a lot more of them down the road. So it’s a competitive game, and give them credit, but I also thought we had a pretty good game.

About going down to 11 forward early and how the group coped
Yes, it’s obviously not ideal. I think it just gives the guys more opportunity to take more ice time and I honestly thought the whole group played pretty well. They had their push and we pushed too. I think on the power play there are chances that I think we want to hang on and maybe it’s another game, right? But like I said, it was a competitive game.

After watching Quinton Byfield score again after getting his first Tuesday
They always say the first is always the hardest and for him you could definitely tell he was gripping the stick pretty hard so it’s really nice to see him get one last fight. Today, you know, a bit more relaxed and he finished on his chance. This is the Q we know, works really hard, has advanced skills and logs a lot of minutes for this team. He is an important piece for us.

Jim Hiller
On Vancouver “Kings win their own game”
I thought they were a little bit quicker to dent and a little bit stronger once they got there. It’s an even game, but I thought they were a bit faster and a bit stronger when they first arrived. It’s not something we want to be proud of, we’re trying to be that team, so give them full marks for that.

On managing a team that ran with 11 forwards and 5 defenders for much of tonight’s game
You never want to be down, but we played a lot with seven last year, down to five defensemen, we saw Juice out there and Phil went back there a little bit, 4-on-4, so we just have to do it. the. I don’t really think it’s that difficult (for the coach). There are times when for me they are not that big, for DJ, sometimes he goes down to five defenders anyway. So, you want to be fresh when you do that, I don’t think we were completely fresh, or as fresh as we wanted to be tonight, so that makes it a little more difficult.

About establishing flow in a game with players out and a ton of special teams time
In the first period, for sure. They had seven minutes on the power play, we had four I think, so it’s pretty much all special teams. You have a group of guys who play a lot and a group of guys who don’t get on the ice at all. So not really any flow for the first, but then we started fresh in the second.

On the test tonight of a physical match
I thought the Nashville game was pretty physical, so I’d say this might be the second most physical game. Yeah, I mean we came out on the short end of it, so it wasn’t good enough. I think losing Tanner early was a big part of it, we could have used him in a heavy game like this for the full 60, so it probably hurt us more than we know.

If he is concerned, Jeannot could be suspended after his match penalty
No, I’m not. (Reporter – How is such a penalty dealt with when the penalty was already assessed with the expulsion?) It’s one that’s timing, it’s close, there’s not much you can do. It’s a split second reaction, it’s not being lazy and catching someone or carrying your stick higher than it should be.

On the team’s play in the third period, the game chases in search of an equalizer
We’re down so we’re pushing a bit and they defended well, give them credit, they didn’t take a lot of risk in the third so there wasn’t a lot of space there. We made some plays that probably weren’t high percentages. I thought we could have probably thrown a few more right on the net, on the pads and tried to get something. It didn’t go our way in terms of connecting a nice passing game, so it was probably disappointing in terms of not being just a little bit more direct there.

Hiller added after the game that he had no further update on defensive end Mikey Anderson, who left the game in the second period with an upper-body injury.

Notes –
• Forward Quinton Byfield (1-0=1) scored his second goal of the season, his third point (2-1=3) in his last two games.
• Since the start of the 2023-24 campaign, only Cole Perfetti (+22) and Seth Jarvis (+25) have a higher plus/minus among skaters selected in the 2020 NHL Draft than Byfield (+19).
• Defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov (1-0=1) scored his first goal of the season and extends his point streak to a third straight game, marking the sixth time in his career that the blueliner has established a streak of such length (Last: 2 -1=3, 3 GP; April 6 – April 10, 2023).
• Forward Alex Laferriere (0-1=1) picked up his 14th point of the year with his sixth assist of the season. The first period assist marked Laferriere’s first career assist against the Canucks.
• With the assist, Laferriere becomes the seventh Kings skater to reach the six-assist mark. The Kings now join the Buffalo Sabers (7), Florida Panthers (8) and Winnipeg Jets (10) as the only four teams this season to have at least seven players with as many helpers on the campaign.
• Center Phillip Danault (0-1=1) had his seventh assist of the season and extended his assist streak to a fourth game (1-4=5).
• Forward Trevor Moore (0-1=1) picked up his seventh assist of the season and extended his home point streak against the Canucks to a fourth game (2-2=4) dating back to April 10, 2023.
• Forward Warren Foegele (0-1=1) had his second assist of the season and first assist at Crypto.com Arena as a member of the Kings.

The Kings will hold an optional practice tomorrow at 11 in the Toyota Sports Performance Center.