The Los Angeles Kings' plan this season was clear. They wanted to build a team based on depth that could roll four lines and attack in waves. 

A great idea in theory, but in practice, it doesn't work without elite talent at the top of your lineup. 

You need depth to win in the playoffs, but you can't win on depth alone. 

Game One against the Edmonton Oilers exposed this flaw in Rob Blake's roster building. 

The elite talent of Edmonton blew away the top on LA's lineup. 

Connor McDavid headlined the dominance with five assists, all primaries, Zach Hyman finished with a hat trick, a goal and an assist for Leon Draisaitl and four points for Evan Bouchard rounded out a dominant performance from Edmonton's stars. 

The Kings started the game with Phil Danault's line and the Drew Doughty-Mikey Anderson pairing matching up against McDavid's line. 

Anderson struggled with this matchup early, getting spun around by McDavid on Edmonton's opening goal after nearly being posterized by Draisaitl a few minutes prior. 

The Oilers second goal came from poor defensive coverage from the Danault line and the Vladislav Gavrikov-Matt Roy pairing. 

The third goal came after Doughty had his pocket picked behind the net by McDavid who fed an open Hyman in front. 

At this point, Danault's line was a -3, with the Kings' top pair a -2. 

That was the end of Edmonton's 5-on-5 production, but the damage has been done. 

The Kings' top-6 forwards and top-4 finished a combined -4. 

There wasn't much from the Kings' depth either, Pierre-Luc Dubois grabbed a goal and finished a +1 and the fourth line had a goal taken off, but they hardly dominated. 

Relying on your depth to make up for the top of your lineup being so heavily overpowered was never a recipe for success. 

The idea that the Kings don't have four equal lines they can roll instead of a traditional 1-4 setup is a nice sentiment but not very effective. 

Teams that are contenders that are truly built on depth, teams like the Dallas Stars, Vegas Golden Knights, Carolina Hurricanes or Winnipeg Jets, still have elite talent. 

They might not have the super-elite talent like McDavid or Nathan MacKinnon, but they still have the superstars to fight off and match those players, at least enough to let their depth make a difference. 

The Kings don't have that, and that's a big problem for their playoff ambitions.