LOS ANGELES –– The Kings took to the skies, but they were already experiencing turbulence on the ground ahead of their six-game road trip, which will begin Sunday in Pittsburgh.
They lost to those same Penguins on Oct. 16 at home, giving up four unanswered goals to fall 4-2 in a game not dissimilar to their most recent home loss. Thursday, they led 2-1 but went scoreless for 49 minutes and slipped 5-2 to the undermanned Florida Panthers. In all, they’ve lost three of their past four games and six of seven matches at home this season.
In 2024-25, the Kings gave up four or more goals at home just seven times and still managed to win three of those games. In 2025-26, they’ve already ceded four or more six times in just seven home games, accounting for their half-dozen losses at Crypto.com Arena.
Their only stretch of positive momentum came during a five-game journey, and now they have a six-gamer that’ll also take them to Montreal, Toronto, two national capitals (Ottawa and Washington) and conclude in San Jose, as their last trip did.
So, are room service, pillow mints and hotel concierges what the meandering Kings need?
“I don’t know if I have a good answer for that,” Kings coach Jim Hiller responded. “What I would say is, whenever the next game comes, whether it’s at home or on the road – I don’t think there’s an advantage to get out on the road – we have to be ready from the start.”
Hiller was also asked why his team had been making so many costly mistakes. Despite efforts by defenseman Mikey Anderson to downplay the Kings’ blunders against Florida – turnovers near either blue line led directly to three goals and a puck-handling gaffe by goalie Anton Forsberg accounted for a fourth – glaring errors have disrupted many of even the Kings’ better-structured efforts.
“We are making mistakes and (opponents) are capitalizing; we are not capitalizing when we get our opportunities,” Hiller said, effectively answering the question by restating it.
Forward Trevor Moore hit the trifecta of clichés when discussing the Kings’ offensive woes – their power play and overall attack have been in the bottom quarter of the league for most of the campaign – saying they needed to get to the greasy areas, create traffic and bear down.
“It’s not too complicated,” echoed Hiller, whose answer to every question seemed to be to simplify and go to the netfront.
That worked for Anže Kopitar on Thursday, when he finally scored his first goal of the season via a power-play deflection. The Kings entered the game with just two goals all year from their four regular centers. Both were scored by Quinton Byfield in the first four matches of the season.
While Kopitar’s 20th and final season hasn’t gone according to script between underperformance and an injury, Pittsburgh captain Sidney Crosby and right-hand man Evgeni Malkin have been thriving in their 21st campaign together. They have combined for 39 points in 15 games, more than 13 of the 21 players that have dressed for the Kings this season have produced in sum.
Anderson made a rare play Thursday that saw a defenseman connect with a forward to create a goal off a breakout. His stretch pass engineered a goal for Perry, who at age 40 has been the Kings’ best player in the early going. Joel Edmundson’s assist was his sixth of the year, though all six helpers have been of the secondary variety.
Edmundson’s partner, Brandt Clarke, still leads the Kings’ defenders in scoring despite not having come up with a point in his past four games. As the Kings sputter out of the gate, there has been renewed speculation about the possibility of Clarke being traded as a means of infusing the team with immediate needle-moving talent.
Jimmy Murphy of RG Sports reported that while teams had been expressing interest in Clarke, a 22-year-old with tremendous promise and four more years of team control remaining, the Kings had thus far rebuffed inquiries about Clarke.
The Kings will see some other talented young defenders on this trip with the Canadiens’ Lane Hutson and Senators’ Jake Sanderson. Against the Maple Leafs, they’ll contend with a resurgent Auston Matthews, who’s on a three-game goal streak. In D.C., former King Pierre-Luc Dubois (lower body) is out for the year, but Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin is still going strong, having scored his NHL record 900th goal Wednesday. Upstart San Jose is led by emergent superstar Macklin Celebrini, whose Sharks lost 4-3 on Oct. 28 in what Drew Doughty described as the Kings’ worst game of the season.
Kings at Pittsburgh
When: 11 a.m. PT Sunday
Where: PPG Paints Arena, Pittsburgh
TV: FDSN West