PRESEASON FINAL – Kings 1, Sharks 3 – Doughty, Villalta, McLellan

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• News post

• Zach Dooley

• Drew Doughty
• Matthew Villalta

• Todd McLellan

The LA Kings suffered their first regulation defeat of the preseason, by a 3-1 margin on Wednesday evening at Toyota Arena in Ontario.

# Drew Doughty

Total, I’ll probably play three or four, so a couple more after this one. I could already play regular-season games.

It definitely took a little bit of the competitive edge out of the game and yeah, definitely the flow, you’re sitting down on the bench and you lose your legs. You saw guys start going out, twirling around, but you’re still not skating, you’re just twirling around. It’s not something you want to happen as a player.

I think he’s a great player, he sees the ice very well, he makes very good plays, I can’t say enough about his offensive ability. He can learn a little bit on the other side of the puck, but who couldn’t when you come in as an offensive defenseman. I went through the same stuff, I had to learn how to play defense and we’ve got a lot of good guys on our team who can help teach him. I don’t want to say he’s NHL ready, but he’s basically NHL ready.

# Matthew Villalta

Yeah, that was the first one ever for me so very exciting. Bill let me know yesterday during practice that I’d be starting tonight, so obviously a very exciting opportunity to wear the Kings jersey down here in Ontario in front of all of our fans, it was very special. I just wanted to go in there and do the best job I could. As the game went on, it felt better and better and I feel like I adjusted to the pace and got my game speed back, which I wanted to do earlier off the scrimmages we had during camp. I think, all in all, we would have liked to get the win, especially in front of our fans here, but sometimes that’s the way it goes, it’s hockey. Other than that I thought it was a good day.

100%. We had a really good crowd tonight and I definitely heard them. Like I said yesterday, anytime you get to play here in the Inland Empire, it’s a treat to play in front of our fans and you want to go out there and try and give them the best show you can. It was very exciting and I think [the fans here] have a lot to be excited about this year.

I think the biggest thing is just game intensity, especially for not playing all summer. Going into camp you try to ramp that up, maybe a few weeks before camp and obviously it takes a few scrimmages and practices to really get it back and feel comfortable. It’s a fun challenge definitely. When you get up here in the NHL preseason, there are a lot of skilled players, they’re elite, they make plays happen real quick, tape to tape passes and shooters are pretty accurate. It was a real good challenge and a lot of fun.

# Todd McLellan

I can’t remember three panes of glass in one game, but it’s good for us to come out here. We have good, loyal fans in this part of the country and they support our minor league team very well. Yeah, it wasn’t the best night in terms of ice conditions, or obviously the glass, the momentum of the game and the ability to evaluate it, but it still meant something for us to come here. It’s important that we did that.

Just keep on playing him, he’s getting tested every night. Different elements, different factors, different teams. He played in Vegas the other night in a sold out building, coming here and trying to figure out all of the momentum stuff in a game, fatigue setting in a bit for him, so he’s getting tested. He’s earned a very valuable off day tomorrow and he’ll pick back up with the rest of the group tomorrow.

It was nice to see number eight back out there. One, it’s great to see him back out there. He’s got enthusiasm, he’s excited to play so he was trying to find his game. It’s been a while since he’s played and that was tough night to do it. Even for us, we can’t really evaluate real well. We’ll look at where players were going, but the ice conditions were terrible and the ability to connect passes and stuff wasn’t very good and that’s Drew’s game. He got a sweat and he got to play around players get physical, which was great.

It’s huge for both of them. We tried to split the night, knowing that Moore and Danault were playing, so we tried to split the night with Sammy Fagemo and Gabe. Was it fair to them, I don’t know, it’s a tough evaluator, I wish it was perfect conditions. They both played well.