The Kings moved two points closer to clinching home ice for the first round of the playoffs Thursday, riding two goals from Kevin Fiala and goals from Quinton Byfield, Anze Kopitar, Alex Laferriere and Jordan Spence to a 6-1 rout of the Ducks at Crypto.com Arena.
Andrei Kuzmenko and Adrian Kempe each had three assists.
Cutter Gauthier scored for the Ducks, his 20th of the season, early in the second period. But Kings goalie Darcy Kuemper didn’t give up another, extending his streak of games yielding two or fewer goals to 15, one short of the modern NHL record.
The win gave the second-place Kings a four-point lead over the third-place Edmonton Oilers in the Pacific Division with four games to play. The Kings and Oilers are almost certain to meet in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs for a fourth consecutive season and home ice could be critical for the Kings, who have the NHL’s best home record (30-5-4).
The Oilers won the last three playoff series with the Kings but all three opened in Edmonton.
The Kings needed just 84 seconds to take the lead, with Byfield scoring from the slot on a power play. Gauthier matched that 1:46 into the second period, blasting a snap shot past Kuemper from the right faceoff circle. But Kopitar put the Kings in front to stay 31 seconds later, redirecting in a Mikey Anderson shot from the blue line for his 20th goal of the season.
That marked the 14th time Kopitar has scored 20 or more goals in a season.
Fiala doubled the lead on a power-play goal from the top of the right faceoff circle 2 ½ minutes later before Laferriere made it 4-1, batting down a loose puck at the top of the left circle, then fanning on a shot from the crease before backhanding a second shot.
Fiala and Spence closed the scoring in third period, with Fiala netting his 32nd of the season on the power play and Spence getting his fourth. For Kuzmenko, the three assists gave him 10 points in the last six games while Kempe, whose wife, Sian, gave birth to the couple’s first child, a girl, earlier this week, has nine points over the same six-game span.
The Kings were without defenseman Drew Doughty for a second straight game. Doughty’s absence was related to the broken left ankle that caused him to miss the first 47 games of the season. He is listed as day to day
Despite the loss the Ducks, with 35 wins, have already matched their best regular-season total since 2018-19.
