The Los Angeles Kings and Pittsburgh Penguins both apparently like playing against the opposing conference, so something will have to give Sunday when they face off in Pittsburgh.
The Kings are 15-5-3 against East teams after their 4-3 overtime loss Saturday at Philadelphia. The Penguins are 13-4-5 against the West.
Pittsburgh has lost two straight games overall, but earned points in both and now has an eight-game point streak (6-0-2). The Penguins are 17-2-2 in their past 21 games.
The Penguins took a day off Saturday while Los Angeles played, but Pittsburgh will be playing its third game in less than four days given the afternoon start, as well as its fifth game in eight days, and seventh in 11 days since a taxing six-game road trip that included a 6-2 loss at Los Angeles.
Fatigue has been a concern for the Penguins.
“We’ve played a lot of hockey here, and just trying to fight through the fatigue aspect,” said Pittsburgh coach Mike Sullivan, whose team fell to Detroit 3-2 in a shootout Friday after dropping a 3-2 overtime game Thursday against Seattle.
Top-line winger Jake Guentzel noted that the Penguins shouldn’t feel sorry for themselves.
“I think everyone kind of goes through that right now,” he said. “A lot of teams are playing a lot of games. We just have to find ways to find that rest and make sure we’re ready to go for a full 60 minutes. … We’ve got two more before the (All-Star) break, so we’ve got to buckle down and get those two, and then we can get away from it and relax a little bit.”
Whether it was tired bodies or general searching for better combinations, Sullivan scrambled his bottom three lines throughout Friday’s game.
“We made some tweaks,” Sullivan said in an understatement. “We’re trying to find combinations that are going to help us win.”
Still, the Penguins came out of Friday’s game feeling like it was an improvement.
“It’s the same result (as against Seattle), so it could be hard to feel good about it,” Pittsburgh defenseman Mike Matheson said. “At the same time, we need to know that was a better game and build off of it for (Sunday).”
This will be the Kings’ fifth game on a six-game trip through the East before the All-Star break. They are 2-0-2.
On Saturday, Los Angeles came back from a 3-1 deficit in the third period to force overtime before falling to Philadelphia, which ended a 13-game losing streak.
“The fact that we were able to get a point with our ‘B’ game is a good thing, but we can’t rely on that too often,” said Kings coach Todd McLellan, adding that his club was subpar beyond its third-period surge.
Los Angeles will be looking to put that game in the rearview mirror and travel across Pennsylvania for a second straight matinee.
“I think our team does a good job of staying in the moment,” McLellan said. “When you’re on the road for two weeks, that’s a long time, but (if) you put some wins together, I think you can enjoy the trip a bit at least.”
McLellan did not have an update on defenseman Mikey Anderson, who left Saturday’s game after being hit in the head by a puck.
–Field Level Media
