Since Peter Laviolette’s hiring in Los Angeles a few months ago, there’s been a lot of discussion about the high-tempo, attacking system he’s bringing to the Kings. What there hasn’t been much discussion of is what that system will actually look like when it’s on the ice.
This article serves as our inaugural offering for a new Mayor’s Manor series, where we’ll be breaking down key tactics behind the on-ice play of this year’s Kings squad. While gathering research for this debut article, we found the proverbial Ark of the Covenant: a talk Laviolette himself gave at a USA Hockey coaching symposium in the summer of 2016. In it, he laid out his offensive system — the philosophy behind it, the rules that govern it, and the tactics that execute it.
Perhaps the catch is whether a decade-old presentation still applies to today’s game. Coaches evolve, systems change, and the version of Laviolette who spoke to a room of USA Hockey coaches in 2016 might not be the same version stepping behind the Kings bench in October. However, when combining the messaging in this seminar with his introductory press conference, and then watching the tape, it all lines up.
The core theme is still there; the DNA remains.
Laviolette’s coaching debut behind the Rangers bench came on October 12, 2023 against the Sabres. And one could easily argue, the very first goal of that game is likely the closest thing we have to a preview of what the Kings will look like in their season opener on September 30. Why? How?
Well, in just one sequence, from Buffalo securing a rebound in their defensive zone, to the puck sitting in the back of their net about 25 seconds later, the progressive structure of Laviolette’s forecheck, neutral zone, and attack were on full display.
Let’s walk through it.
Forecheck
The Sabres have just recovered a rebound in their own end. This is where forecheck systems can break down — because the moment a team loses possession deep in the opposing zone is when the instinct to chase kicks in and a player’s discipline gets tested.
Laviolette has described his forecheck as a 2-3. He used to refer to it as a 2-1-2, but changed the terminology for a specific reason. “I wanted them to think about it as a 2-3,” he told the room in 2016, “Two guys on the attack looking to turn over pucks, three guys in a good defensive position.”
Adjusting the wording there is a small but deliberate move. Vocabulary shapes behavior, and behavior shapes a team’s identity. Call it a 2-3 enough times and the third forward starts thinking of himself as the defensive support first and a potential attacker second. Here’s what that looks like:
Watch what happens the instant Buffalo gains control of the puck. The two New York forwards deepest in the zone — Filip Chytil (F1) and Alexis Lafreniere (F2) — pivot immediately and attack. As F1, the first forward applying pressure, Chytil goes straight at the puck carrier and attempts to take away time and space. Lafreniere, as the supporting forward, mirrors his positioning and takes the opposite side, attempting to intercept the Sabres forward and create a turnover — or force him up the ice and into F3. In this clip, that’s Artemi Panarin.
Based on Laviolette’s own definition, Panarin does drop a little low here and displays a 2-1-2 structure — but there’s a justifiable reason. The system aims to match or outnumber the opposing team in every puck battle. With Chytil on the far side, and Buffalo attempting to break it out on the near side, Panarin drops down to apply pressure and clog the lane. Once the attempted breakout runs out of space, the Sabres smartly reverse the puck and the Rangers forecheckers all curl back to avoid getting caught behind the play.
The shape of this type of forecheck has been in Los Angeles before. It’s very similar to the heavy 2-1-2 used by Darryl Sutter during the 2012 and 2014 Stanley Cup runs. Whether referring to it as a 2-3 or a 2-1-2, they are both aggressive forechecks.
Where Laviolette’s system distinguishes itself is in the…
Neutral Zone
Most Kings fans are all too familiar with the concept we’ll look at next. Despite an aggressive forecheck, Laviolette has been known to run a modified neutral-zone trap — and in this case, it’s a 1-3-1 configuration. However, the visual here isn’t a team sitting back and waiting for the opposition to reach the red line before making a move. Instead, once the Sabres begin their breakout, notice how players start to form the structure and attack the puck.
One thing worth noting before we go further: F1, F2, and F3 aren’t fixed positions like LW, C, and RW. They’re situational roles, and whoever is in the right spot fills the job.
The forward closest to the puck becomes F1, the supporting forward becomes F2, and the forward furthest from the puck (or behind the play) becomes F3. The same goes for the defensemen. Whoever is on the strong side is D1, and the weak side is D2. This is how systems stay coherent as bodies fluidly move around each other, and the puck shifts from one side of the ice to the other.
In this clip, Lafreniere (now F1) stepped up to become the point man in the structure, applying pressure on the puck carrier. Buffalo’s defender passes the puck up to avoid this pressure, but his teammate runs into resistance at the blue line. At this point, strong-side defenseman Adam Fox (D1) pinches, poke-checks, and creates a turnover. The reason he has the freedom to do this — without worrying about getting blown past — is because Panarin (now F2) is sliding back to support the transition defense. New York gains possession and in the next clip begins their transition to offense.
The difference between the 1-3-1 in previous seasons and now is that the neutral-zone trap will be deployed as a situational tool, not used as an identity. As Laviolette said at his introductory press conference, “This is an attack-oriented game.”
That’s what Laviolette wants to bring to the Kings this year. Offense first, defense second.
Attack
“I want to have a pounding, relentless attack that never leaves the offensive zone.” This was one of the first things Laviolette stated while laying out his coaching philosophy in 2016.
His teams don’t wait around, and they certainly don’t work the puck around the perimeter waiting for the perfect look (sound familiar?).
The moment they get the puck back, all five players are expected to start moving north. When they cross the offensive blue line, the goal is to attack the middle with speed and get a shot on net. And when there’s a shot available with traffic, take it.
Now that the Rangers have the puck, watch Panarin (highlighted below).
After curling back up the ice to receive a pass from Chytil, Panarin drives the middle with speed. In Laviolette’s system, this would usually be where the puck carrier distributes wide. But Panarin has traffic in front and a shot lane. He takes it because having a shot mentality is important. Why?
“It creates second chances.”
And that’s exactly what happens. Panarin fires off the goalie’s pad — almost as if it were a self-pass. He then recovers the puck and passes it cross-crease to Lafreniere, who fires it into a wide-open net.
Just 25 seconds. That’s it.
That’s all it took for the Rangers to move through three distinct system phases — forecheck, neutral zone, attack — and bury the puck. It also provides a view into what an aggressive Laviolette system looks like when it works. And now the Kings will get a chance to run it this upcoming season.
What It Means for the Kings
For the better part of a decade, the Kings have been a team defined by a defensive identity that produced regular-season points and playoff disappointment in equal parts. Five straight first-round exits. Near the bottom in offense, 29th in goals last season. Only five goals in a four-game sweep.
Laviolette’s hiring should mark the resounding end of that era.
The Kings haven’t had a 100-point scorer since Wayne Gretzky in 1993-94. Panarin put up 120 in his first season under Laviolette when they were together in New York, and he was better than a point per game player in his 26 games here after the trade. He turns 35 in October, so nobody should be promising anything, but this is the first time in a long time that the 100-point mark is even realistically in the conversation.
LA’s superstar forward isn’t the only one who stands to gain from a more aggressive system. Quinton Byfield has the size and speed to be the middle-lane driver this system runs through. Adrian Kempe is a finisher who’s about to get the puck in better spots, wherever he ends up playing. And defenseman Brandt Clarke has been waiting for a coach who wants to utilize his skills up in the attack, rather than behind it.
Whether it all holds up is another question, but — on the surface — there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic for this season.
Going forward, we’ll be analyzing clips from Kings games and highlighting how Laviolette implements some of the concepts we outlined above, along with other elements we’ve yet to discuss — such as puck movement in the offensive zone, controlled zone entries and exits, and how the defensemen get involved in the attack.
The idea is that over the course of this season we hope to highlight how to watch games in a way similar to how a coach does — seeing the structure instead of just the result.
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