The Kings extended their winning streak to four games in their return home on Tuesday night. Facing off against Eastern Conference’s Columbus Blue Jackets for the second and final time this season, the Kings completed the season series sweep with a 5-1 victory.
It was a quiet first period that went scoreless for the first 18 minutes, but a beautiful individual play by Quinton Byfield spoke volumes with 1:22 remaining. Byfield deked his was around Blue Jackets captain Zach Werenski, regathered the puck and beat Elvis Merzlikins with forehand-to-backhand move for his 18th goal of the season.
Sparking the scoring bug, the two teams combined for three goals in the first 11:49 of the second period. With two of those goals coming off of the stick of Pierre-Luc Dubois, the forward extended the Kings’ lead not once but twice. Netting his first goal of the game, Dubois buried a power-play goal 1:27 into the period off of a full-ice pass off the end boards by Brandt Clarke. Just over three minutes later, the Blue Jackets Adam Boqvist banked in a goal from behind the goal line for his first goal of the season. Putting the Kings back up a pair of goals was Dubois at the 11:49 mark when linemates Alex Turcotte and Byfield found the center in slot by himself where he beat the goalie five hole. With his pair of goals, Dubois has now tallied six points (3-3=6) over his last six games.
The Kings then extended their lead in the final 20 with a pair of goals, beginning with a power play goal from Kevin Fiala at the 15:56 mark. The goal for Fiala marked his 14th goal of the season and snapped a five-game pointless drought. Adding another goal to the Kings tally was Drew Doughty with just 23 seconds to go in regulation, blasting a slap shot from the point for his 12th goal of the campaign.
Cam Talbot made his second consecutive start for the Kings and stopped 33 of the 34 shots faced.
Other notable news from the game includes Viktor Arvidsson who exited from the game 17 seconds in with a lower-body injury. No announcement has been made on his status. He will be evaluated Wednesday morning.
