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Lesson Is in Eye of Beholder

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In the aftermath of the Kings’ worst performance of the season, there was more than one view of what could be gained from the loss.

Defenseman/captain Rob Blake provided the conventional line.

“We learned you have to play 60 minutes,” he said after a 5-4 loss at Edmonton on Saturday night.

“You can’t take a period off against anybody in this league.”

The Kings took the second period off and were outshot, 15-3, by the Oilers.

So they came home with a lesson--except the head King didn’t see it that way.

“Nothing,” said Coach Andy Murray of what his team brought back from Edmonton. “I don’t think you take anything out of a loss. You only learn when you win. You don’t learn when you lose.”

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Nor, he said, does the performance reflect on the seven-game, season-opening trip that preceded the Kings’ inaugural game at Staples Center. It was the end of the trip, not its punctuation.

“It only puts a damper on [Saturday’s] game, the two points that we desperately wanted and didn’t get,” said Murray, who gave the Kings Sunday off. “Every game stands on its own merit.”

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The 4-1-1 start for nine points going into Saturday’s game ranks among the best in the 33-season Kings’ history.

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They were 5-0-1 for 10 points in 1980 and 1992, both playoff seasons, and had nine-point beginnings in 1974, 1990, 1993 and 1995.

In only two of the seven aforementioned situations did the Kings win Game 7 (1990, ‘95).

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The annual Kings’ luncheon, sponsored by the Los Angeles Sports Council and Chamber of Commerce, is Tuesday at Staples Center. Tickets are $60. For reservations and information, call (213) 482-6352.

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