After scoring just 9 goals in their previous 7 games, the Los Angeles Kings have lit the lamp 10 times in their last two.
So, what worked in the last two that wasn’t before? A number of things, actually.
What A Rush
Of the last 10 LA goals, 5 have come off the rush. Attacking in transition has always been an important aspect of the Kings’ offense, but they have been inconsistent in generating these rush chances. In Carolina, they were not only able to generate more rush looks, but they cashed in at key times.
Four nights later in Los Angeles, the Kings really got their transition game going against Montreal, scoring three times off the rush, including the game winner from Kevin Fiala. (NOTE: I am registering Warren Foegele’s penalty shot goal as a rush goal because of the chance that led to the penalty shot.)
The plays that led to these goals are just as important as the goals themselves. Clean breakouts are vital in creating rush situations, and in some of the examples above, the Kings forwards on the wall made excellent plays to start the up-ice attack despite dealing with heavy back-pressure.
As for the sudden uptick in rush chances, Head Coach Jim Hiller suggests it may be by design:
-“I think we’ve pushed out on the breakouts a little bit more, we have our forwards exiting the zone, I think you saw a little more speed. We’ve definitely had more rush chanced, as far as the overall makeup of the chances, rush, faceoff and o-zone. I’d like to think that’s a little bit of the fact that we’ve put a little bit more emphasis on them.”
Forecheck Please
While the Kings still use a passive neutral zone forecheck, they’re ideally an aggressive forechecking team. While the Trevor Moore goal against Carolina was generated off the rush, it still took excellent puck pursuit from Vladislav Gavrikov to create the second opportunity for Moore. Phillip Danault and Fiala also scored goals on plays that were started by aggressively pressuring opposing defensemen.
The forecheck is another aspect of the game that the Kings have failed to find consistency with. Hiller didn’t sugar coat it after the Kings lost 2-1 in Calgary last month:
-"They started forechecking us, we didn’t forecheck, we started trying to skate through them and they just broke it up and forechecked us, then they carried the play a little bit. Third period, that’s an uncharacteristic read by us on the penalty kill, we just got out of our structure for a minute. They made us pay. The third period is fine, first period is really good, second period I didn’t like because we got forechecked and we should be doing that.“I think we should be frustrated, I thought the first period was pretty good, but we had a lot of turnovers in the second period. We were forechecking in the first and didn’t in the second. If I had to come up for a theme when things haven’t been going well, it is not being willing to forecheck in the second period.”
Hiller kept the same energy after a loss to Detroit on January 27th:
-“I think we should be frustrated, I thought the first period was pretty good, but we had a lot of turnovers in the second period. We were forechecking in the first and didn’t in the second. If I had to come up for a theme when things haven’t been going well, it is not being willing to forecheck in the second period.”
If both the rush and the forecheck aren’t going for the Kings, you get a stretch like the one we saw from January 18th - January 27th.
In those seven games, they generated next to nothing in transition, leaving the lion's share of their attack in the hands of their defensemen. They regularly went low to high and tasked their defensemen with funneling pucks to the net, hoping to generate rebounds or get a seeing-eye goal via traffic.
It can work in the short term, in theory, but realistically, will not work in the postseason where teams are blocking shots at a higher rate than ever before and the Kings lack the talent at the point to get shots through consistently. It certainly doesn’t help that the defensemen that can get shots through are either on a short leash or have been injured all season.
This “point shot offense” is not going anywhere–it’s what the Kings do. But if they can get back to their rush game and increase the intensity on the forecheck, they can have a versatile attack. And they’ll absolutely need that in April when they more-than-likely face a team that can hurt them in a variety of ways.