Garon gives Kings stability

Mathieu Garon continually stretched his right arm and snagged the pucks out of midair. He twisted his Slinky-like spine around the crease, managing to block one shot, then another. He centered himself and smothered shots from the blue line.

These were welcome sights to the Kings in a 3-1 victory over the Calgary Flames in front of an announced 17,043 at Staples Center on Saturday night. They also will lead to more uncomfortable questions.

Garon’s modest 22-save performance helped keep the Kings from falling further behind in their desperate effort to be considered a playoff-caliber team. Meanwhile, watching from the bench was Dan Cloutier, anointed the Kings’ No. 1 goaltender before the season began.

The situation called for tact.

“I don’t know about that,” Garon said when asked if his play warranted being the top goaltender. “As I said at the start of the season, we have two good goalies here and whoever is playing the best is going to play. That’s always the case.”

Garon, it could be argued, is that guy.

The Kings needed this type of game from a goaltender, any goaltender. Their season-long status among the NHL’s doormats had reached a point where only two teams had fewer victories than the Kings this season before Saturday’s game.

“We can’t just say that we’re doing our best, that’s not good enough right now,” captain Mattias Norstrom said. “There is no more waiting period. All the teams around us, in our conference and in our division, are pulling away.”

The situation looked a tad better Saturday after goals from Anze Kopitar, Alexander Frolov and Michael Cammalleri erased a 1-0 deficit. But the Kings have provided offense before, with at least three goals in their last six games.

The medicine for what ailed them was Garon, who was steady and occasionally spectacular. On one Flames’ power play, he was sprawled across the crease, extending his legs from post to post to stop two shots.

“When a goalie is going good, making saves, it gives you confidence out there, the way Matty did tonight,” Cammalleri said. “You just have to concentrate on keeping guys out of the danger zones.”

This has been a difficult situation for the Kings. Garon would certainly win a People’s Choice Awards-type vote as the Kings’ top goaltender. But Cloutier was brought in to play that role after being acquired from the Vancouver Canucks in a trade last summer. That was underscored when he was given a two-year, $6.2-million contract extension before he’d played one game for the Kings.

Yet, he has hardly lived up to the title. Cloutier ranks last in goals-against average and save percentage among the 37 goaltenders who have played in at least 10 games. He has demonstrated a disturbing habit of giving up goals in bunches, including five goals on 12 shots before being pulled from his last start.

Garon, meanwhile, has looked better, particularly in direct comparison. He has given up two or fewer goals in six of his 11 starts. He could hardly be blamed for the one goal Saturday.

The Flames took a 1-0 lead in the first period by scoring on a two-on-four rush. Cammalleri and Kopitar gave Alex Tanguay red-carpet treatment, as he squeezed between the two to bang in a rebound 12 minutes 50 seconds into the game.

The Kings’ defense improved significantly as the game went on, and Garon handled everything else that did get through.

“Right now, we need our goaltenders to give us games like this,” Craig Conroy said. “We have two guys who can do that.”

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chris.foster@latimes.com