Kings coach Murray ‘Jack and Doughty are coming of age’

One of the more newsworthy items coming out of Kings practice this morning was coach Terry Murray revealing how he’ll use the just-called-up Slava Voynov.

With Alec Martinez going on the injured reserve list yesterday, it allowed the Russian blueliner to return to Los Angeles.

Murray said he’ll be pairing Voynov with Willie Mitchell, moving Drew Doughty to play with Jack Johnson, and leaving Rob Scuderi with Matt Greene.

On the reuniting of Johnson and Doughty, a pair Murray went to quite a bit following both having success for their national teams at the 2010 Winter Olympics, here’s what the coach had to say…

“I used it on the power play, going back a couple years ago. They played very well together. They’re coming of age where they play hard for each other. There’s always a time early in a career, when you’re young, when you want to try to do a lot of stuff out there. Right now it’s about the team and a pair of d-men being very good, playing a lot of minutes, playing in important and critical situations, and getting the job done. All four of those guys that we’re talking about are mobile, they pass the puck, see the ice and, ideally, you want to get the puck going as quickly as possible and have those guys joining as part of the attack. And helping on that secondary part of the scoring.”

Did the fact the Kings are playing Anaheim, a division opponent, twice this week have anything to do with how Murray decided to put the pairs together?

“No. I think it’s just a comfort for the Voynov and Mitchell pair, the fact that they played a bunch of games together and complimented each other,” said Murray. “It’s just an easy move for me to make, in my opinion, to put those two together.”

Murray also said he will start Jonathan Quick tomorrow night vs. the Ducks, but hasn’t made any decisions regarding the game in Anaheim on Thursday.

More notes and quotes from today’s LA Kings practice (as well as other related articles) are linked below for your reference.

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