Two teams in the thick of the Western Conference wild-card race will meet Sunday night when the Los Angeles Kings face the Utah Mammoth in Salt Lake City.
The Mammoth (36-28-6, 78 points) hold the first wild-card position, while the Kings (28-25-16, 72 points) are in third place, six points behind Utah and one point behind the Nashville Predators.
“We know where it’s at — you need points every night right now,” Kings defenseman Mikey Anderson said. “I mean, everyone around us, we’re all in the same boat. So it’s scoreboard watching, but enough, you got to do it yourself to get yourself in.”
Los Angeles missed a chance to make up some ground on Saturday when it took a 1-0 lead against the visiting Buffalo Sabres but ended up losing 4-1.
Artemi Panarin scored and Anton Forsberg made 29 saves for the Kings, who are 2-2-2 in their past six games.
Red-hot Buffalo broke a 1-1 tie with two goals midway through the third period.
“You’ve got to be able to just play the exact same game for 60 minutes, and you don’t need to be playing high risk or whatever in the last 10 minutes,” Los Angeles interim coach D.J. Smith said. “And whatever reason, we haven’t been able to close games out.”
Panarin has five goals and 11 assists in 13 games since coming from the New York Rangers in a trade. Kings forward Joel Armia played 13:44 in his return after missing 10 games because of a back injury.
The Mammoth enter Sunday’s game off a 4-1 loss of their own, this one on Friday night against the Anaheim Ducks in what was the second game of a back-to-back set after a 4-0 win at Vegas on Thursday. Utah has lost five of seven games (2-3-2).
The Mammoth generated 30 shots on goal, but Dylan Guenther was the only one who scored for them on Friday. Vitek Vanecek made 20 saves.
“You can see the way we played in the third; we generated a lot of offense,” Utah coach Andre Tourigny said. “We had great opportunities, we had momentum, we were aggressive and all of it. We were not on our heels, so really the only thing I don’t like is the scoreboard.”
Guenther has six goals in his last eight games and has 22 points (13 goals, nine assists) in his last 22 games.
“Solid effort, back-to-back, they had a good push, we had a good push, and we just got to bear down a little bit more on some plays,” Guenther said. “I mean, it’s right there, so I think there’s some positives.”
Utah’s likely starter in goal Sunday, Karel Vejmelka, is 2-6-0 against the Kings with a 3.58 goals-against average (GAA) and a .885 save percentage. Darcy Kuemper of the Kings would be making his first start against the Mammoth.
Armia scored twice and the Kings won the teams’ first meeting 4-2 on Dec. 8. Adrian Kempe added a goal and an assist for Los Angeles. Guenther scored and Clayton Keller had a goal and an assist for Utah.
The teams will meet in Los Angeles next Saturday.
