Bruins’ Burst Baffles Kings

To say that former King Byron Dafoe and his new teammates, the Boston Bruins, dominated the Kings on Wednesday night would be an understatement.

In easily his best game since being traded over the summer, Dafoe defeated his old team for the second time in two weeks with 39 saves in a 5-3 victory before 10,268 at the Forum.

Dafoe got plenty of offensive support from the Bruins as they scored three goals in a 102-second stretch of the second period to complete a Southern California sweep. On Monday, Boston defeated the Mighty Ducks, 3-0, in Anaheim.

Former King Dimitri Khristich, who was traded with Dafoe for Jozef Stumpel and Sandy Moger in late August, scored his third goal of the season for the Bruins, who improved to 3-2 on their eight-game, 15-day trip. Ted Donato, Jason Allison, Mike Sullivan and Tim Taylor also scored for Boston.

Yanic Perreault, Sean O’Donnell and Glen Murray scored for the Kings, who made a late comeback with two goals in the final five minutes after goaltender Stephane Fiset was pulled.

“We played poorly defensively for about six minutes in the game and they scored four quick goals,” King Coach Larry Robinson said. “We were fighting at the end, trying to score. . . . We had a lot of good chances on the power play but we couldn’t put them away.

“I can’t fault [Fiset] for all of the goals. The first two goals were direct result of rebounds. . . .

“We had too many guys looking around and not playing well defensively.”

The Kings outshot Boston, 42-27, but they still dropped to 1-3-3.

Dafoe was tested early and often by his old teammates. Murray got things going with a blast from the side boards less than a minute into the game, but Dafoe was ready with a glove save. Two minutes later, the line of Luc Robitaille, Perreault and Moger attacked, but again Dafoe was up to the task with a stick save on a shot by Moger.

The Kings had several scoring chances on Dafoe, including a close shot by defenseman Garry Galley from the edge of the crease, but Dafoe met the challenge. The Kings finally were able to knock the puck into the net at 9:29 when Robitaille scored on a rebound from the left circle, but the goal was not allowed because Galley tripped over Dafoe outside the crease and was called for interference.

On Boston’s first power play, King defenseman Rob Blake made a couple of crushing checks on former teammate Khristich and the Bruins were able to get only two shots on goal. The Bruins started their second power play at 12:39 when O’Donnell was called for roughing.

This time, Fiset felt the heat as Boston kept constant pressure in the Kings’ zone, but he was able to make athletic saves on point-blank shots by defensemen Ray Bourque and Kyle McLaren.

After killing the Bruins’ power play, the Kings tried to catch a break when defenseman Mattias Norstrom attempted an up-ice pass to O’Donnell coming out of the penalty box. Bourque, however, intercepted the pass and made the Kings pay.

Bourque fed a wide-open Donato, who beat Fiset with a backhand shot inside the left post to give the Bruins a 1-0 lead at 14:47.

The Kings began the second period aggressively and tied the score at 1-1 on a goal by Perreault 6:02 into the period. The score was set up by O’Donnell, who kept the puck in Boston’s zone, and Robitaille, who assisted from the left circle on Perreault’s fourth goal of the season.

The Kings’ goal only seemed to make the Bruins mad.

In a span of 1:42, Boston erupted to score three unanswered goals to take a commanding 4-1 lead. Khristich put the Bruins back into the lead with his third goal of the season, thanks to a touch assist from rookie Sergei Samsonov from behind the Kings’ goal at 7:07.

Boston took a two-goal lead when Allison knocked in the puck through a scrambling King defense at 8:21. The Bruins then finished their three-score charge with a rebound goal by Sullivan at 8:49 as the Kings fell behind by their biggest deficit of the season.