A GREAT 58 IN L.A.

LOS ANGELES, CA — Fifty-eight down, 24 to go in a Los Angeles Kings season that seems to grow more intriguing and entertaining by the day.

Closing out their four-game roadtrip in Boston with a stirring, come-from-behind overtime victory, the Kings return home for a friendly stretch of games – 8 of the next 10 games in LA and half of the 10 against the bottom feeders in the Pacific Division, the San Jose Sharks and Seattle Kraken.

While they haven’t clinched a playoff spot and they don’t possess the abundance of talent to stray from their identity – a checking team that doesn’t blow out the opposition but rarely gets blown out itself – what they’ve done is put themselves into a position to make the post-season for the first time in four seasons by simply winning games. It’s cliché, but they find games to win, a trait no more in evidence than in Boston win. The game was the final one of a roadtrip, was the second of the back-to-back and once it started they were dominated in the opening moments. They surrendered the first goal, gave up a late second period goal and entered the third period trailing, a script that should have put them on the place with an L. But when you stay in the fight and keep getting contributions from your depth players – that night it was Trevor Moore (a 2022 point production machine) and Andreas Athanasiou (who defines what a “hard luck” season is), you hit the charter with a precious two points.

With a .612 winning percentage with two dozen games remaining, they don’t need help to make the Stanley Cup Playoffs. If they underachieved and played only .500 hockey (a record that would be disappointing given their body of work), it would result in a 95-point regular season, a total that likely gets them to a Game 83. “Controlling your destiny” can be an empowering thing for a team that hasn’t played games of consequence this late in a season for quite a while.

Yes, it’s still too early to order the playoff-clinching champagne – as deserving as it may be when it does occur – but the finish line is clearly in sight. What once looked to be a mad scramble for a dozen teams for the eight playoffs berths in the Western Conference is no longer. The herd of contenders has thinned to nine teams short of a big run by the Anaheim Ducks, Vancouver Canucks or Winnipeg Jets. While not counting out those teams just yet (Vancouver is 7-3-0 in its last 10, 16 of its last 25 games at home and start a huge seven game homestand Wednesday), the fewer pursuers the better to give breathing room for a minor losing streak or the injury factor, which has reared its head as the team returned home.

The 3-1-0 roadtrip looks great on paper, but the price paid for the critical Ws was significant. On Wednesday, Coach Todd McLellan’s update of the injured could have been better, could have been worse – forwards Viktor Arvidsson and Brendan Lemieux and defenseman Mikey Anderson have all been deemed week-to-week with the latter two hitting the Injured Reserve list. The Toddfather gave further clarity by saying that Lemieux and Anderson’s stay on IR will be longer than the minimum seven-day stint.

It's never a good time for injuries and Los Angeles has played through others (most notably, Drew Doughty’s sprained knee that caused him to miss 19 games) but the sheer number of them in consecutive games will put the organizational depth to the test. Furthermore, the missing impacts different facets of the team – an important energy player, a goal scorer who has found his stride on the top 6 in recent weeks and a top pair defenseman.

There are internal replacements for each of the three, but the options vary in quality. The forwards available are more familiar – Lias Andersson has returned from IR, Jaret Anderson-Dolan remains with the team and both Andreas Athanasiou and Carl Grundstrom will be asked to step up. But the more impactful absence is Anderson, who gives a reliable 20 minutes a night for the shallowest spot on the depth chart, left defense.

Jordan Spence, who has received solid reviews for his nearly a point-a-game season in Ontario has received the call but Jacob Moverare, who didn’t look out of place in his three-game debut likely gets the first shot at fill the hole Anderson’s injury creates. Looming in the distance is Alexander Edler but he still hasn’t returned to the ice, which would put his next game after the NHL trade deadline on March 21.

And there’s the challenge for General Manager Rob Blake, do you go with both somewhat familiar and unfamiliar options to get to the finish line? Athanasiou and Grundstrom have produced at a bottom-six level in the games they’ve played but is either a reasonable replacement for Arvidsson should his injury linger? If Athanasiou and Grundstrom don’t fill the need and Anderson-Dolan and/or Andersson take on more prominent roles, if one must keep in mind that the forwards that have been recalled from Ontario this season have literally produced nothing (Anderson-Dolan, Alex Turcotte and Samuel Fagemo haven’t registered a point in 17 combined games, Andersson started the season in Los Angeles).

It may come down to the level of belief in the system McLellan has installed. Is there enough confidence in a system that has produced a 100-point pace season with a roster that objectively doesn’t possess 100-point talent? Can the organization use the cliché’ “next man up” plug in their internal assets and assume similar results? Does Blake avoid wading into the trade deadline pool, exercise the patience that has finally paid off and wait for the injured to heal? Or do you not leave things to chance and buy some insurance for a team that has clearly shown it needs to be rewarded for a performance few saw when the team started 1-5-1?

The good news is that it’s a buyers’ market for such insurance. Since the Eastern Conference top eight playoff qualifiers have been set for months, there aren’t any fringe teams holding on to the hope of a big run to get the post season. Eight Eastern teams are out of the playoff mix and sellers to varying degrees. Add the Chicago Blackhawks, Arizona Coyotes and the Seattle Kraken who have assets to flood the market. That’s why the top defenseman rental, Ben Chariot still has a Montreal address and the comparable deal from last season – David Savard to Tampa Bay for a first- and third-round pick will be a tough get. I’m not advocating moving the first-round pick for a rental, Los Angeles is not a team that will be put over with one move. The first-round pick, even in the mid-teens, needs to be used as currency to land a bigger fish with term this summer.

But if they do go the rental route, what makes sense? From a blueline perspective, I like the flexibility of Calvin de Haan in Chicago, a left shot defender who can play both sides. He won’t be a contributor on offense but has strong defensive stats against quality competition, so he fits the profile of the typical Los Angeles defender. Among forwards, while it’s tempting to consider Arizona’s Phil Kessel, a proven net filler, it’s difficult to see where he fits given the scheme the Kings play. While not a pure rental because he is a restricted free agent with arbitration rights, Montreal’s Artturi Lehkonen fits the profile of a middle-six forward in this system and there’s no more front office person more familiar with him (and the rest of the Habs for sale) than Blake’s current senior advisor, Marc Bergevin.

Besides, we’ve got plenty of time to speculate on the Jakob Chychrun trade (check TFP’s top 40 Trade Watch List for a new LAK entry) and Filip Forsberg UFA signing.

CASTING A NET

With 24 games remaining in a space of 49 games, it will still take two goalies to get to a Game 83. From a statistical perspective, the Kings are receiving average goaltending when it comes to save percentage (.903) but Petersen’s numbers in a more important column the won-loss, has grown stronger. He’s won 11 of his last 15 decisions yet is on track for the lowest save percentage of his four-year career (.904). A function of having a better team in front of him for sure but if you split his 26-game season in half, his save percentage is essentially the same in the first 13 as the last but he’s now getting results he didn’t early in the season (7-5-1 vs. 9-3). Quick has enjoyed the benefits of the recent hot streak with four wins in his last five decisions and his .908 save percentage would suggest he’s the equal or marginally better than his net mate. But unlike Petersen, Quick’s superior save percentage is weighted in favor of his early season performance. He registered a .931 save percentage in the first 16 games of his 32-game season and has stumbled to an .882 in the back end.

So, with Petersen on a roll and Quick appearing to have regressed (but still registering wins), has Petersen put his head in front of the goaltending horse race to position him for more than a 50/50 split in the final 24?

I tried to coax an answer out of McLellan about the usage of Jonathan Quick and Cal Petersen down the stretch, but he isn’t tipping his hand, going full coachspeak when I asked about his goalie rotation.

“I just know we’re going to have one starter on Thursday and then we’ll come in Friday morning and we’ll discuss it again,” he said.

Regardless of their destiny in the final two dozen games, the Kings have become a competitive team with an arc that should place them in legitimate Stanley Cup contender status soon. Given that I did not see them as a playoff team at season start, they are ahead of schedule assuming post-season play. They are within shouting distance of the Pacific Division title (and you never know, is Calgary’s incredible run sustainable until mid-April?) while this season is one where they have successfully turned the corner and validated decisions that were made, the team is an unfinished product with multiple holes still in need of filling but what this season does is allow those moves to be done from a position of strength rather than weakness.