Not All Is Lost for Kings

Opportunity lost.

Sort of.

First-period goals by Detroit’s Niklas Lidstrom and Sergei Fedorov and an empty-net score by Pat Verbeek beat the Kings, 3-1, on Tuesday night, but the daily math lesson that is the Western Conference playoff race is that sometimes when you lose, you win.

Edmonton and Phoenix also lost, so at Tuesday’s end, the Kings were back where they started: in sixth in the West, a point from fifth, four points from playoff oblivion but with another game having run down through the hourglass.

If they blew an opportunity to move ahead of Phoenix before an announced Staples Center sellout, at least the Kings didn’t move farther behind.

It has been that way for a while now.

Detroit has a different situation. The Red Wings are 4-0-1 in their last five games but are comfortably in fourth place in the West and figure to get no better because they are chasing St. Louis, which shows no signs it is willing to be caught.

The Kings spotted Detroit two first-period goals, then got one back in the third when Jere Karalahti bull-rushed the Red Wing net, pushing his way past Kirk Maltby and sliding the puck between Martin Lapointe and Kris Draper. Goalie Chris Osgood was occupied by a traffic jam in front of him and had no chance at 12:42.

Only 33 seconds later, the Kings went on a power play when Brendan Shanahan interfered with Ziggy Palffy, something that happened much of the evening.

But the power play lost some of its power when Luc Robitaille and Detroit’s Chris Chelios traded unsportsmanlike-conduct penalties and tough words from near the Red Wing goal all the way to the penalty box. It was left for Detroit to kill off the final 90 seconds of the power play, which it did.

Two quick goals, less than two minutes apart, took the Kings apart in the first period, and one illustrated a particularly vexing problem in their power play.

After Lidstrom scored on only the second Red Wing shot of the game, the Kings went on a power play when Igor Larionov high-sticked Bob Corkum.

Just over a minute into the man advantage, King defenseman Garry Galley found himself at an extreme disadvantage, with Fedorov to his right and Draper to his left, bearing down on the goal on a two-on-one after a turnover in the attacking zone.

Fedorov took care of the goal, his 20th of the season and the 12th short-handed goal the Kings have given up all season.

No team has given up more.

With the lead, Detroit merely circled the wagons, generally effective against a team that is 10-21-4 when the other guys score first; 5-14-3 when behind after a period; and 1-21 when behind after two.

By keeping the Kings generally bottled up for the final two periods, the Red Wings made it easier for Osgood, who is unbeaten (4-0-1) in his last five games.

The Kings generally play well against Detroit and won the last two games between the two, so there was little surprise that the Red Wings were stymied for the first 10:45. They went shotless in that span, but broke out with Lidstrom’s goal at 13:29.

It came when Maltby dug a puck out of the corner and sent it to Mathieu Dandenault, who directed it to Lidstrom. His shot beat goalie Jamie Storr to the stick side and caromed off the post and into the net for a 1-0 lead.

Storr finished with 25 saves in only his second start since Feb. 19. It was only the second time he has played against the Red Wings and he has yet to beat them.

Stephane Fiset, the winning goalie in the Kings’ two recent victories over Detroit, is on injured reserve because of a groin strain.

Fedorov’s short-handed goal gave Detroit some cushion, but the Kings pressured Osgood, Palffy shooting just wide after faking Draper off his feet; and Jozef Stumpel pushing a shot that the Red Wing goalie struggled with until getting some help.

But most of the King shots resulted in only one attempt on goal per trip, because the Detroit defensemen were dogged in their pursuit of rebounds to clear.

The loss dropped the Kings to 1-2-1 in their home stand, which has three games to run.