Muzzin leads Kings past Penguins 5-3 for 3rd straight win

Ehrhoff took a pass from and with the Pittsburgh defense backing off his wrist shot from the slot beat FleuryLos Angeles took a 1-0 lead on defenseman Drew Doughty’s fourth goal of the season on the power play at 2:26 of the second period.

“I definitely haven’t had the best luck in the world but I don’t really want to think about that”, he said.

Ah yes, it’s been a while since someone Kings-related trotted out the ‘ol East Coast bias routine, right? “Even though the shots might not have been lots, they had a lot of Grade A chances”, Muzzin said of the Penguins, who scored three times on their first 12 shots against Jonathan Quick and took 20 shots overall.

Christian Ehrhoff scored his first goal as a King at 9:53, when Marian Gaborik intercepted a pass in Pittsburgh’s zone and laid it off to Ehrhoff, who glided past the blue line unabated and flung it by Fleury to make it 2-0. “But as long as we keep finding ways to win, that’s what we’ve got to do….”

Pittsburgh quietly got on the scoreboard on a Chris Kunitz slapshot 23 seconds while the details of Lucic’s goal were still being announced. “Maybe the personnel isn’t as highly touted, but the way we play and our character back there is the same”. The Penguins closed to 4-3 on center Sidney Crosby’s sixth goal of the season at 2:39 of the third period.

The Kings (16-8-1) beat Penguins goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury four times on 18 shots in the second period, no small feat because Fleury had shut them out twice last season.

“You expect good starts from (the Kings)”, Crosby said.

The snorefest looked to continue into the second period, with the Kings eventually going up on shots 20 to 4 early in the second.

After a scoreless first period, the Kings broke through on the power play, triggering a spree of five goals for both teams in nine minutes and 52 seconds. The next goal was earned by Anze Kopitar, even though he was only the secondary assist on it. Kopitar managed to pin the puck in the offensive zone against three other Penguins players through a shift change. The Norris Trophy finalist has scored goals in consecutive regular-season games for the first time since October 19-21, 2013.

Left wing Milan Lucic sealed the victory with an empty-net goal at 18:45 of the third period, after the Penguins had pulled Fleury in favor of an extra skater. Penguins D Letang sat out with an undisclosed injury. Maatta missed the last six games because of an upper body injury….

Pittsburgh saved face at least on the scoreboard, but there’s no doubt which team looked better today.