The Kings kicked off their five-game road trip in Columbus on Saturday night with a 3-2 overtime loss. Trailing multiple times in the game, the Kings never held a lead and overcame a bad break in the third period to earn a point.
The Kings began the first period strong, but couldn’t find the game’s first goal. That goal went Blue Jackets captain Zach Werenski. Scoring 9:24 into the game, Werenski beat Darcy Kuemper far side high glove after Luca Del Bel Belluz split four Kings just inside the blue line and hit his captain with a pass in stride. The Kings responded just over 3:30 later. Scoring almost immediately after Philip Danault’s offensive zone win to Kevin Fiala, Fiala one-timed the puck and created a rebound in front of the crease. Danault won the race to the loose puck and beat Elvis Merzlikins on his own rebound for his fourth goal of the season and sixth point (3-3=6) in his last five games against the Blue Jackets. The game went tied 1-1 after 20 minutes with a 12-5 shot advantage in favor of the Kings.
The second period went scoreless with the Blue Jackets leading in the shot department 8-7 across the 20-minute stanza.
The game picked up in the third period and saw three goals, two of which counted. The Blue Jackets retook the lead just 2:51 in when Dante Fabbro threw a seeing-eye shot on net from the point through traffic, scoring his fourth goal of the season. The Kings then thought they evened the score at 2-2 midway into the period, but it was not to be. After entering the Blue Jackets zone and sustaining zone time for over 30 seconds, Jordan Spence fired a shot from the blue line. Failing to get to the net, the puck bounced down to the side of the crease and Alex Laferriere banged the loose puck into the goal. The Blue Jackets challenged the play for offsides and were successful, negating the goal. Still trailing late in regulation, the Kings pulled Kuemper for the extra attacker and it worked. Tying the game with 1:05 to go in regulation, the Kings took advantage of a failed exit attempt by the Blue Jackets. After multiple shot attempts from the Kings couldn’t get through the traffic in front of the net, Fiala swiped the puck towards the net off Merzlikins and Quinton Byfield pocketed the rebound for his 10th goal of the season.
Into overtime and the early back-and-forth action resulted in a penalty shot for Werenski. Kuemper stood tall on the attempt denying Werenski and the game continued. Having dodged one bullet, the Kings couldn’t fight off the next attack by the Blue Jackets. Kirill Marchenko won the Blue Jackets the game with 1:15 remaining in overtime after isolating a Kings forward on a rush attempt and weaving through the crease to beat the outstretched lower body of Kuemper.
Kuemper stopper 21 of 24 shots on the night.
