Quebec forward Phillip Danault won his bet on Saturday afternoon in the Los Angeles Kings’ 5-2 victory over the Montreal Canadiens at Staples Center.
Danault, who joined the Kings as an unrestricted free agent last summer, was playing a game opener against his former team. He ended the meeting with an assist.
Viktor Arvidsson, Arthur Kaliyev, Rasmus Kupari and Alex Iafollo, twice, backed him up by hitting the target for the Kings (2-5-1), who had not relished a victory since their opener on 6 October. All except Arvidsson rocked the strings in power play.
Josh Anderson and Ben Chiarot fought back for the Canadian (2-7-0), who was trying to sign a second straight victory for the first time in the campaign.
It was a seventh straight start for Jake Allen, the team’s No. 1 goalie in Carey Price’s absence. Allen, who signed his first shutout for CH in the last game, had a more difficult game than the last and ended the game with 34 saves.
His opposite, Cal Petersen, was not put to the test too much by the Habs, on their way to victory. He ended the game by repelling 26 shots aimed at him.
As is often the case with afternoon games – the initial face-off was at 1 p.m. local time – both teams were slow to get going.
Canadian striker Christian Dvorak also took advantage of the Kings’ nonchalance to set the table for the first goal of the match at the end of the first period.
Dvorak recovered a free puck in the neutral zone before moving into enemy territory and passing the disc to Anderson, alone, who beat Petersen with a shot from the wrists flush with the ice on the stick side with 1:38 to play the first third. It was his second goal in as many games – he had shot in an empty net against the San Jose Sharks on Thursday night.
The Kings, however, tied the game early in the second period, courtesy of Arvidsson, following a staging similar to that which led to Anderson’s net.
Kaliyev then gave the home team a 2-1 lead on the power play, at 12:19, with a powerful wrist shot that stole Allen’s vigilance, over the glove.
At that point, the Canadian could still hope to come from behind in the third period. However, he rather flattened out on his return from the locker room.
Kupari also first used his precise wrist shot to beat the Habs stalker over the glove, in numerical superiority, at 1:53 of the last third. Iafallo then jumped on Allen’s generous throw-back into the enclave to take the score to 4-1, less than four minutes later, before sealing the game’s end late in the period – and yes, still with the benefit of a man.
The game was out of CH’s reach at the time, but that didn’t stop Chiarot from flickering the red light behind Petersen’s net for form, with 2:20 to go.
Head coach Dominique Ducharme had made no changes to his roster compared to Thursday night in the 4-0 victory over the Sharks.
For the Kings, all-star defenseman Drew Doughty went missing after suffering a serious knee injury earlier this month.
The Canadian will complete his four-game trip to the American West with a visit to the Ducks in Anaheim on Sunday afternoon.
Goalkeeper Samuel Montembeault could be called upon to defend the Bleu-blanc-rouge’s cage against the Ducks, since it will be a second game in 24 hours for the Montrealers.