Yes, the Kings lost 3-1 to the Ducks – or at least that’s what the box score said, even though Anaheim’s roster read more like an AHL team.
And for a guy who has yet to record a single point in two pre-season games, Scott Parse is quickly becoming one of the key focal points of the team’s news items right now.
Below are ten tidbits from last night’s second (and final) pre-season game at Staples Center…
* Andrei Loktionov scored the lone goal for the Kings. He also had two shots on goal and two takeaways. In the faceoff circle, he only won two of seven draws (29%).
* For the second game in a row, Alec Martinez led all Kings players with 22:25 of total ice time. Slava Voynov wasn’t far behind, with 22:20 total.
* Voynov only had one official shot on goal in the game. Anze Kopitar and Justin Williams each had five shots on goal.
* Dustin Brown, Dustin Penner and Matt Greene led the team with three hits. That wasn’t much of a consolation for Greene, who said this about the game – “No real positives at all, actually. Just a bad game for us. We got outworked. We didn’t really have a great effort, great execution… We just got outworked in our own building.”
* Back to Martinez – “He had a couple good looks and missed the net,” said coach Terry Murray. “He had some problems receiving passes tonight. There were a lot of pucks that hit his stick and went underneath.”
* Murray also said he can carry eight defensemen on the trip to Europe, which had to be good news to Voynov and Thomas Hickey – assuming Drew Doughty still isn’t signed by the end of the week.
* Murray on Loktionov – “I would like to see him have the puck on his stick more. There were a couple of opportunities for him to enter the offensive zone with the rush. I’d like to see him be that type of a player a little bit more. Overall, I like his game though.”
* Kevin Westgarth had a scrap with Anaheim’s Brian McGrattan early in the second and didn’t return to the game, due to a blow he took under his left eye. Murray said they’ll continue to monitor it, with another update expected today.
* Murray also said it’s “too soon” to determine if Loktionov would be better off playing on the Kings fourth line or spend another year in Manchester. When followed with a ‘we have four games in five nights coming up’ quote, it sounded like he was leaning towards not making that decision until just before the team leaves for Europe.
* Oh yeah, Parse… “He’s still not moving the way I would like to see him move,” said the Kings coach. “Some plays, just inside of his own zone, on breakouts, turning the puck over. He has a chance there, off an offensive-zone attack, and there’s not much happening on either side of the puck for him right now.” He later added that he’s not worried about stats right now. Instead, he wants “to see him get back to work.” Then, Murray again reiterated that he wants Parse on the third line with Jarret Stoll. BUT, “His plays and decisions with the puck are not real good (right now).”
Unrelated to the outcome of the game, just prior to the action getting started, the Kings officially announced nine more roster cuts – including top prospects Brandon Kozun and Tyler Toffoli. Full details of the roster trimming can be found here.
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