Kings tie it late before losing to Golden Knights in OT
LOS ANGELES — The Kings teased the crowd on hand and stole a point but stumbled 25 seconds into overtime, slipping in a 3-2 loss to the Vegas Golden Knights on Wednesday night at Crypto.com Arena.
The Kings have dropped four of their past five games and 12 of their past 17.
They entered – and exited – the game buoyed by “pity points,” as captain Anže Kopitar has described them. Only three teams have accumulated fewer wins and only one has compiled fewer in regulation so far this season.
They got one of those after eight of their previous nine defeats came in regulation, but they still ceded two points to the division leaders on Wednesday.
Kevin Fiala scored a goal and assisted on Brandt Clarke’s equalizer late in regulation. Darcy Kuemper had 24 saves. Kopitar and Joel Armia missed their fifth consecutive game while Trevor Moore was unavailable for his eighth in a row. Corey Perry exited the lineup anew, returning to the side of an ailing family member.
Jack Eichel assisted on the opening goal by Braeden Bowman, a power-play marker for Mitch Marner and Mark Stone’s game-winner as Vegas won its season-best fifth straight. Akira Schmid stopped 22 pucks.
Early in overtime, Fiala’s turnover inside the offensive blue line sent Eichel and Stone the other way with numbers. Fiala hustled back to block Eichel’s shot, but Eichel recovered it to find Stone in front for an uncontested winner.
The Kings appeared to be on their way to their 13th one-goal effort of the season and their second in a row, until Clarke knotted the score with 87 seconds remaining in regulation.
With Kuemper pulled, Fiala fended off Ivan Barbashev at the blue line, delivering the puck for Adrian Kempe. After Eichel lost his stick, Kempe used his body position and then pivoted to deliver a pass to the activated Clarke at the backpost. His sixth goal provoked an ebullient celebration.
With 8:37 on the clock, Kempe’s hooking minor put the Kings shorthanded and, 44 seconds later, down a goal.
Stone’s pass from the left corner of the zone toward the middle of the blue line found Marner, who skated into a vast expanse to deliver a searing wrister from the inner part of the right circle. Marner was the prized acquisition of the summer’s free agent crop, acquired via sign-and-trade from Toronto.
After 46:24 of game action had elapsed, the Kings got on the scoreboard and pulled even. Four shot attempts, three of which hit the net, came in seven seconds, the last of which was a firm smack into a huge opening by Fiala. Linemates Alex Turcotte and Andrei Kuzmenko earned the assists on the Swiss star’s team-leading 17th goal of 2025-26.
For a second straight outing and the eighth instance this season, the Kings failed to score through two periods, falling to 1-4-3 in those games.
Vegas drew first blood in the second period, at 3:56. Following some heavy forechecking and a prolonged puck battle, Eichel emerged with the puck. He slid it across to Bowman, who was all alone in front to stickhandle his way into a forehand goal. It was the undrafted rookie’s first goal since Dec. 2 and fifth since his Nov. 13 debut.
The Kings played soundly early but produced no tangible results. They have been shut out in the first period 27 times, they have blanked their opponents through 20 minutes 25 times and have skated to 13 scoreless ties at the first intermission.
More to come on this story.