Rookie Learning Like Clockwork

Rookie forward Dustin Brown has impressed the coaches with his competitiveness and work ethic. He added a new asset -- timekeeping -- to the ever-growing list Tuesday at practice in El Segundo.

The unofficial NHL rookie credo is don’t make the same mistake twice. In training camp, King Coach Andy Murray had asked him how long practice had been, and the 18-year-old from Ithaca, N.Y., didn’t have an answer.

And Tuesday?

“It was a funny incident at the end of practice. I wanted this to be a 51-minute practice, and I thought I was right on the time,” Murray said.

” ... I said, ‘Brownie, how long was that practice?’ He said, ‘Fifty-two minutes.’ He made sure he looked at the clock. He’s already established himself, you can disagree with the coach.” Murray was joking.

Brown, the fifth-youngest player to make his debut in King history, is still looking over his shoulder every day, even after three regular-season games and four goals in six exhibition games.

“The thing with me, it’s never a for-sure thing. It’s still training camp for me,” he said. “They still have the option to send me down [to juniors] whenever they want.” Which means practices become almost a minute-to-minute thing.

“I guess that’s something you learn with experience,” Brown said. “You might be able to take a day off when you’ve played five years, six years. But me, my first year, I’ve got to bring the best to the table every day.”

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Two of the injured defensemen, Aaron Miller, with a fractured left wrist, and Mattias Norstrom, who has a bruised chest, remain sidelined indefinitely, and team officials are hoping they can return to the lineup at least by the end of this long homestand.

“Aaron’s getting close and he’s practicing real hard,” Murray said. “Matty [Norstrom] is not practicing right now. He’s still off the ice, so I think the earliest possibility would be next week for those players. They’re both kind of in the same time frame.”

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The Kings will have a moment of silence before tonight’s home opener for Kevin Donovan, the team’s director of corporate partnerships who died Sunday of stomach cancer at the age of 31.

TONIGHT

vs. Ottawa, 7:30, Fox Sports Net

Site -- Staples Center.

Radio -- KDIS (1110).

Records -- Kings 2-1-0-0, Senators 1-0-0-1

2002-03 record vs. Senators -- 2-0-0.

Update -- The Kings have not lost to the Senators since Jan. 11, 2000, going 4-0-1 and outscoring the Senators, 18-11, in that span. Season-openers at home have been favorable for the Kings; they hold the longest active streak in the league (5-0-4), dating to the start of the 1994-95 season. Former King Bryan Smolinski, who was traded to Ottawa in March for the rights to defenseman Tim Gleason and future considerations, has no points and two penalty minutes in two games. Restricted free agent right wing Martin Havlat signed a one-year deal with the Senators on Saturday night, which was just in time for Ottawa’s three-game West Coast swing.

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Homespun

The Kings have the best home-opener record in the league at 5-0-4 since 1994-95:

*--* Team Undefeated home openers Kings 5-0-4 Dallas Stars 4-0-1 Colorado Avalanche 3-0-1 Edmonton Oilers 2-0-2

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King home openers since 1994-95

*--* Date Opponent Result 94-95 Toronto T, 3-3 95-96 Colorado W, 4-2 96-97 N.Y. Islanders W, 1-0 97-98 Ottawa W, 7-4 98-99 Boston W, 2-1 (OT) 99-00 Boston T, 2-2 00-01 St. Louis T, 4-4 01-02 Phoenix T, 2-2 02-03 Phoenix W, 4-1

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