The Los Angeles Kings scored the final five goals to break a 2-2 tie and cruised to a 7-2 win over the visiting Boston Bruins on Sunday night.
Seven different players scored for Los Angeles (39-21-9, 87 points). Drew Doughty’s goal at 8:46 of the second period began the game-winning run.
Quinton Byfield and Tanner Jeannot each logged a goal and an assist, while Anze Kopitar, Warren Foegele, Andrei Kuzmenko, and Samuel Helenius also scored for Los Angeles, which moved in front of the Edmonton Oilers for second in the Pacific Division with a third straight win and eighth in the last nine.
Brandt Clarke, Adrian Kempe and Joel Edmundson each dished out two assists, and Darcy Kuemper made 11 saves as the Kings improved to 11-0-3 in their last 14 at home.
Elias Lindholm and Morgan Geekie scored goals while Jeremy Swayman allowed seven on 23 shots for Boston (30-33-9, 69 points), which is on a six-game winless streak (0-5-1).
In the second period, Los Angeles took control for good as Doughty slid down to blast home the rebound of a Mikey Anderson shot that Swayman kicked back into the circle at 8:46.
Kuzmenko’s second Kings goal in as many games with 2:22 left doubled the hosts’ lead. Kempe recovered a puck that was dumped from the other end, circled the net and fed a pass from behind the end line to Kuzmenko to slap past Swayman from a tight angle on the right side.
The Kings’ run continued in the third as Kevin Fiala corralled a puck at center and sent Byfield down the middle for a blocker-side wrister at 4:05 and Jeannot deflected a point shot at 9:20.
Helenius clinched the second seven-goal effort in as many nights for Los Angeles with 3:57 left. A wrister from the left circle marked his second NHL goal.
The Bruins scored just 19 seconds in when Cole Koepke fed Lindholm to slide home a backhand goal from the slot, but they lost the lead in the final minute of the first period while being held without a shot for the final 11:42.
Kopitar tied the score on the first Kings shot at 2:43, taking Kempe’s feed through the slot and beating an outstretched Swayman. The hosts took their first lead with 28.8 seconds left in the first as an open Foegele buried Phillip Danault’s centering pass at the left post.
Geekie tied the score 2:07 into the second after Pavel Zacha forced a turnover and threaded a pass down the middle.
Kuemper made multiple key stops on Boston’s first power play after the hosts took the lead in a second period that featured a near-goalie fight that was broken up after Kuemper knocked off Boston’s Marat Khusnutdinov’s helmet.
–Field Level Media
