LOS ANGELES — A seesaw affair that saw a winning goal nullified with 36 seconds remaining in overtime still left the Kings elated by a 5-4 victory in a shootout with the Dallas Stars on Friday night at Crypto.com Arena.
Warren Foegele, Kevin Fiala, Alex Laferriere and Anže Kopitar each scored a goal for the Kings. Fiala added an assist, as well as a shootout goal, and Phillip Danault had two assists. David Rittich had 26 saves.
Matt Duchene scored two goals for the Stars and set up Thomas Harley’s tally to earn his 500th career assist, with Mavrik Bourque adding a goal. Jake Oettinger made 33 saves.
Adrian Kempe scored to open the shootout and Fiala followed by converting to put Dallas down 2-0 with the only two goals in the shootout. It was apropos that Fiala finished the job, given that he had come an eyelash from deciding the result in overtime.
Overtime provided a fitting bonus session for the most sinewy, least predictable game of the Kings’ season so far, with both teams generating opportunities. Fiala appeared to win the game with 36.4 seconds left, but his searing one-timer was taken off the board due to what was deemed goaltender interference by Drew Doughty.
Fiala has five goals and an assist in the past three games, taking his run in the last 11 outings to 13 points with five multi-point showings.
Kopitar had not scored since his two-goal performance against Philadelphia on Dec. 29, but he picked a perfect moment to break out of his funk by redirecting Kempe’s pass into the net with his right skate for his 13th goal of 2024-25 with 8:20 left in regulation. The fortunate break was Kopitar’s 432nd career goal, breaking a tie with Dave Taylor for the third-most in franchise history.
The Stars had taken their first lead of the night on consecutive goals by Bourque (6:53) and Duchene (9:51).
Duchene scored his second goal of the game when he skated directly at Doughty and roofed a wrist shot far side without breaking stride.
Bourque scored the Stars’ second rebound goal of the night when he drove the net to find a Jamie Benn shot that clanked calamitously off Rittich’s left leg.
Dallas threatened early in the final frame when Oscar Bäck dinged the inside of the left post before Mason Marchment had a menacing chance. The Kings then had their opportunities, but Kempe missed an open net from close range and Quinton Byfield couldn’t finish a two-on-one rush after being disrupted by Harley.
After 40 minutes, the Kings led 3-2 thanks to a goal-of-the-year candidate and a gritty effort to regain the lead following an opportunistic score by Dallas.
Byfield recovered the puck just after Dallas took full possession of it, keying a sequence that set him up with a one-timer trailing the play. Though his shot attempt thudded off the end boards, it hit Oettinger’s skate and came to Laferriere to the Kings’ second tap-in tally of the evening. Laferriere’s 14th goal broke a tie at 11:43 that resulted from the teams trading goals at the 9:29 and 8:16 marks.
The Stars pulled even for the second time after they won a protracted board battle and made that possession count. Cody Ceci recorded his first point as a Star after his point blast produced a juicy rebound and Harley, who had smoked Trevor Moore for position, picked up the loose change.
That avenged a stunning goal by Fiala.
Dallas defenseman Liam Bichsel was smarting from a blocked shot and left without a stick while isolated with Fiala, who spun Bischel around completely with his stickhandling before launching a shot between Bischel’s legs and up over the shoulder of Oettinger. Fiala now has 21 goals for the season and five in his past three games as part of a stretch with 13 points in 11 games.
Momentum shifted from the Kings to the Stars late in the first period, allowing the visitors to head to the dressing room with a stalemate.
Dallas piled up the final six shots of the first period and forged together a sequence in which it had six shot attempts in nine seconds with Rittich under siege. Though the Kings survived that onslaught in the final minute, they allowed a buzzer-beater to knot the score.
Duchene received the puck back from Brendan Smith, who fought the Kings’ Tanner Jeannot after the period concluded, and went to work. Duchene’s spin move combined with a slight bump from Mikael Granlund shook Joel Edmundson, while Vladislav Gavrikov hedged to take away inside ice, opening up a shooting angle for Duchene’s equalizer with two seconds showing on the clock.
It took just 11 seconds for the Kings to score when Danault banked a shot off Oettinger’s pad that found Foegele for his 13th goal of the campaign.
The Kings also registered nine of the game’s first 10 shots on goal but could only find the net once.
More to come on this story.
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