DENVER _ The Los Angeles Kings haven't yet reached the one-quarter mark of their schedule, so they saw no point in overreacting after their 4-1 loss to Colorado Tuesday at the Pepsi Center extended their winless streak to four games.
That's wise. But what matters is how well they react and if they avoid repeating the small but crucial mistakes they made against the Avalanche in a defeat that gave them a 1-3-1 record on a trip that started with an exhilarating rout in Toronto.
Colorado scored two goals 22 seconds apart early in the second period on a wraparound by Patrick Wiercioch and a deflection by Rene Bourque after Kings center Nic Dowd had lost successive faceoffs to Avalanche center Carl Soderberg. The Kings were stunned but they made it close on a rare power-play goal late in the period, nicely engineered by Devin Setoguchi and Dowd and finished off by Dustin Brown, before Colorado established some separation in the third period on a shot by Blake Comeau from the high slot. The Avalanche clinched it on Gabriel Landeskog's empty-net goal with 1:37 left in regulation.
"There's just little breakdowns, little turnovers, we missed some checks on the faceoffs. You can't win in this league making those," Brown said. "They're not huge, glaring mistakes. They're just details."
Those details were duly noted by Coach Darryl Sutter. But just when you'd expect him to be angry or bitingly sarcastic, he was calm and almost philosophical and chalked up the third goal against Peter Budaj, which he deemed soft, to "one of those experience plays that are kind of learning as you go."
Not that he will ever easily accept defeat, but he found some consoling elements in this one. Given that winger Marian Gaborik (broken foot) and goaltender Jonathan Quick (groin) aren't expected back anytime soon, and that for the second straight game he didn't have center Anze Kopitar (hand or arm injury), Sutter has to make the best of what he's got. Destroying anyone's confidence serves no purpose.
"Not a great goal on the first one, the goal from behind the net, but I thought we showed a lot of hang-in-there attitude, though," Sutter said. "We made it 2-1 on the power play, on a real good goal by that line, even though it's a power play, and we had chances to tie it up."
Dowd said he remembered little about what happened after the two goals Colorado scored at 1:10 and 1:32 of the second period, after he lost those two faceoffs. But he called the trip disappointing and took responsibility for the sour ending. "It doesn't help that my line was minus-four tonight," he said. "You're not going to win with a single line on the ice for every goal against."
No, it didn't help, but the Kings cut their deficit in half on that goal by Brown, who beat Colorado goaltender Semyon Varlamov from close range. That was only their second power-play goal in their last 10 games, and it should have given them a lift. But Varlamov made 10 of his 32 saves against them in the third period, and they couldn't cash in on an early power play.
"We had one bad shift that kind of put us behind the ball right away," defenseman Drew Doughty said. "We had opportunities to tie that game up and we hit some posts and didn't bear down on a few chances. We've got to make our chances count. Every shift matters. It doesn't matter what the score is, every shift matters. One shift kind of cost us a little bit."
Asked if he felt concerned or worried after four straight games without a win, the ever-passionate Doughty said his emotions were stronger than that. "It's desperate. We need to play more desperate," he said. "When you're losing games it's not fun ... .It's not fun coming to the rink sometimes.
"We've got to be more desperate and treat every single game as if it's a playoff game or a division game, and that's how we're going to get back on track."
They have more than three quarters of the season to do that. Now is the time to react, not to overreact.
