FINAL - Kings 4, Jets 6 - Kopitar, McLellan - LA Kings Insider

Last updated Oct 31, 2022 Edit Source

• News post

• Zach Dooley

The LA Kings dropped a disappointing, 6-4 loss against the Winnipeg Jets on Thursday evening at Crypto.com Arena.

• Anze Kopitar
• Gabe Vilardi

• Todd McLellan

# Anze Kopitar

We can’t expect to win many games with giving up six goals. Whether we can blame it on the PK, not scoring on the power play, bad changes, turnovers, whatever, the bottom line is we can’t give up six and think we have a chance to win.

The first one, stuff like that happens and we were still going, we scored three goals and then we proceeded to give up a shorthanded goal. That should not happen.

You’re still up one, but you certainly don’t want to give one up there. In that moment, we should have been extending our lead instead of giving up shorties.

It’s just playing more responsible.

# Todd McLellan

It’s 29, 30 of us because I’m including us as coaches and we’ve got to decide again and I’ve been saying this for 10 games. 12% of our schedule is gone and we still don’t know how we want to play. I would think the experiment of run and gun that we’re trying to play, like how much more evidence do we need that it doesn’t work. There are simple hockey principles, you don’t turn pucks over at the line, you get pucks in deep, you forecheck, short shifts. The penalties that we’re taking are unacceptable, so there’s a lot of game management situations that go into it and unless the group decides as a whole, we’ll experiment for another 10 games. Maybe we will become the run and gun team. I don’t like our chances, but if that’s how we want to play and that’s what we’re going to keep trying, we’re probably going to keep getting the same results.

Power play. We’re on the power play and our only thought process on the power play is offense. There are times where there’s risk involved in it, but we don’t play risk at all, we just assume everything’s going work out fine and it comes back the other way, what, three times on two power plays. So, you’re in a situation where you have a really good period, you should be up and close to putting a team away early in the game and they’re right back in it, but you want to run and gun, you don’t understand risk, you don’t play risk and you’re not responsible for risk. That’s what happens.

[Gabe Vilardi] has been probably our best offensive player. There are some things going on with Kopi’s line that I’m not happy with and I thought that that Gabe needed an opportunity there. [Would it be considered in future games?] Maybe. What we have right now isn’t working so we’ll have to address it tomorrow.

We could use a better coaching staff, we could use some forwards that committed, we needed D that move the puck and we needed goaltending. There isn’t one area. I told the guys between the second and third, we all own a piece of this. So, dig yourselves out and we didn’t do it.