3 Things to Watch: Avalanche at Kings, Game 4 of Western Conference 1st Round

(1C) Colorado Avalanche at (2WC) Los Angeles Kings

Western Conference First Round, Game 4

Avalanche lead best-of-7 series 3-0

4:30 p.m. ET; HBO MAX, FDSNSC, truTV, TNT, ALT, SN360, SN, TVAS

LOS ANGELES -- The Los Angeles Kings will try to stave off elimination when they play the Colorado Avalanche in Game 4 at Crypto.com Arena on Sunday.

It’s been a close series, with the Avalanche taking advantage of Kings’ miscues to win 4-2 in Game 3. The Kings also had an unfortunate bounce on the Avalanche’s first goal, when Gabriel Landeskog’s shot went wide, went off the end boards, off Kings goalie Anton Forsberg’s skate and in.

“That’s this time of year, right? Sometimes you get the bounce, sometimes you don’t. You have to have a very narrow-minded focus,” Los Angeles forward Scott Laughton said. “It’s tough this time of year. We’ve got to stick to the process, and obviously you don’t like being down. Well, we’re down, but we’re in this situation, and you start with one game and one period, your first shift, and you go from there and see what happens.”

So, will it take a perfect game for the Kings to win Game 4 and force the series back to Colorado?

“There’s that way, but I think you have to be loose now,” Kings interim coach D.J. Smith said. “You know the ultimate end result if you don’t win, so sometimes when that happens, you grip it a little less and you make a play maybe that you wouldn’t have made early on. But I can tell you this: I just finished doing the game, there are a lot of guys playing hard and giving everything they have to win a hockey game. It hasn’t gone our way. The No. 1 thing you can’t do is get down on yourself, get down on your team, get down on your teammates and I don’t see any of that in the room.”

The Avalanche know closing out a team is always the toughest game of the series.

“If we get, we get it. If we don’t, we don’t. We’ll be ready for the next one. The goal is to play a great game and we’ll see where that takes us,” said forward Nathan MacKinnon, who’s happy with the style the Avalanche have played. “We’re super committed to our defensive game. Everyone’s on the same page, everyone’s playing super hard. Guys are playing awesome, so that’s all you can ask for.”

There have been 213 teams taking 3-0 lead in a best-of-7 series, with 98 percent winning (209-4): 129 won in four games, 58 won in five games, 16 won in six games, six won in Game 7 and four lost the series. Eight of the past 10 series that were 3-0 advanced to at least Game 5 (dating to the start of the 2023 first round).

Here are 3 things to watch in Game 4:

1. No Manson for Avalanche

Josh Manson is unlikely to play for the Avalanche after the defenseman sustained an upper-body injury in Game 3 on Thursday, which means Nick Blankenburg will make his Stanley Cup Playoff debut in the veteran defenseman’s place. Blankenberg had three points (two goals, one assist) in 12 games for the Avalanche this season. He won’t be Manson, but coach Jared Bednar said they just need Blankenburg, “to be solid defensively.”

“He’s perfectly capable of coming into our system and being a responsible defensive player and helping us move the puck out of the (defensive) zone and into the offensive zone. That’s what we expect from all of our 'D.' Anything he can add beyond that is a bonus,” Bednar said. “What we’ll miss with 'Mans' is that big, shut-down (guy), being able to close plays out quickly with the size and physicality, being hard at the net front, all the things he brings. It’s a loss, for sure, but I feel good about the option we have in coming into the lineup and being able to help us. That’s why I’m glad we got him a bunch of games down the stretch."

2. Kopitar wants more

That means the longtime Kings forward wants more games, another chance to keep going because he’s retiring when the current playoff run is over. The center has been in this situation before, when Los Angeles trailed the San Jose Sharks 3-0 in the Western Conference First Round in 2014. That year, the Kings went on to win the Stanley Cup. The approach on Sunday? Just leave it all out there.

“I mean, right now we got nothing to lose. It’s focusing (on) tomorrow, having a good start, and just go from there. To think what’s going to happen in a couple days, or four or five days from now, there’s really no need for that. It’s just staying in the moment. Go down there tomorrow and play your asses off, or our (butts) off, and see where that takes us.”

3. Power play will be fine

Yes, we’re hitting this once again because the Avalanche are now 0-for-9 on it through three games. Surprising, considering their personnel. The Avalanche aren’t too worried about it, at least for now.

“It’s not easy to score 5-on-5 at this time of the year, it’s not easy to score on the power play. Would I like to see them chip in? Absolutely. I think we still have the ability to do that in this series, and it be a difference-maker,” Bednar said. “(In Game 3) I felt it gained us some momentum, that we had some scoring chances and got our power-play guys feeling good about their game and some of the things we did in the offensive zone. I’d like to see it sustain more. I’d like to see it get more dangerous but it’s just working through what the Kings are doing. The intensity of the penalty kills this time of the year is high. At some point you need to make a play and put one in the back of the net.”

Avalanche projected lineup

Artturi Lehkonen -- Nathan MacKinnon -- Martin Necas

Ross Colton-- Brock Nelson -- Valeri Nichushkin

Gabriel Landeskog -- Nazem Kadri -- Nicolas Roy

Parker Kelly -- Jack Drury -- Logan O'Connor

Devon Toews -- Cale Makar

Brett Kulak -- Sam Malinski

Nick Blankenburg -- Brent Burns

Scott Wedgewood

Mackenzie Blackwood

Scratched: Zakhar Bardakov, Joel Kiviranta

Injured: Josh Manson (upper body)

Kings projected lineup

Artemi Panarin -- Anze Kopitar -- Adrian Kempe

Trevor Moore -- Quinton Byfield -- Alex Laferriere

Alex Turcotte -- Scott Laughton -- Jared Wright

Jeff Malott -- Samuel Helenius -- Taylor Ward

Mikey Anderson -- Drew Doughty

Joel Edmundson -- Brandt Clarke

Brian Dumoulin -- Cody Ceci

Anton Forsberg

Darcy Kuemper

Scratched: Mathieu Joseph, Joel Armia, Jacob Moverare, Andrei Kuzmenko

Injured: Kevin Fiala (fractured leg)

Status report

Manson is unlikely to play; the defenseman did not practice Saturday after being injured in Game 3. … Turcotte could play for the first time this series after missing the last eight games of the regular season because of an undisclosed injury. ... Ward could make his playoff debut.