1/14 Preview – “Playing Well” Needs To Equal Wins + Perry Out, Armia/Kopitar/Moore Skate, Fourth-Line’s Strong Contributions

TODAY’S MATCHUP: The Kings continue on a three-game homestand as they look to return to the win column tonight against the Vegas Golden Knights, who currently sit atop the Pacific Division.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: The Kings were led by multi-point games from Andrei Kuzmenko and Quinton Byfield in a 6-5 shootout win in Las Vegas back in October. Kuzmenko scored a power-play goal in that game and has eight career points (5-3-8) from eight games played against the Golden Knights, one of four teams he is a point-per-game or better against in his career. Byfield also had two points in that game and tallied a career-high four assists the last time these two teams played at Crypto.com Arena.

KINGS VITALS: The Kings held a full-team morning skate today after opting for a day off the ice yesterday.

Look for goaltender Darcy Kuemper to get the start between the pipes this evening on home ice, his seventh start over the team’s past eight games played. Kuemper has a lifetime record of 8-7-3 against Vegas, with a .927 save percentage and a 2.33 goals-against average, including wins in both of his starts versus the Golden Knights last season.

Here’s how the Kings lined up during morning skate today in El Segundo –

Malott – Laferriere – Kempe
Foegele – Byfield – Ward
Fiala – Turcotte – Kuzmenko
Lee – Helenius

Anderson – Doughty
Edmundson – Clarke
Dumoulin – Ceci
Moverare

Kuemper
Forsberg

The Kings will be without forward Corey Perry tonight, as he unfortunately needed to return home to attend to an illness in the family. The Kings will go with 11 forwards and seven defensemen tonight, with defenseman Jacob Moverare checking back into the lineup.

GOLDEN KNIGHTS VITALS: Vegas has won four consecutive games entering tonight’s action, coming off a 7-2 victory over San Jose on Sunday.

Per Ryan Wallis of the Vegas radio broadcast team, here’s how the visitors lined up last time out against the Sharks –

VGK vs. San Jose

Barbashev – Eichel – Stone
Smith – Marner – Dorofeyev
Holtz – Hertl – Kolesar
Reinhardt – Sissons – Bowman

Lauzon – Theodore
Hanifin – Whitecloud
Hutton – Korczak

Lindbom

— Ryan The Hockey Guy (@RyanHockeyGuy) January 12, 2026

Vegas is currently without defenseman Brayden McNabb and forward William Karlsson, with both players currently on injured reserve. Forwards Pavel Dorofeyev and Jack Eichel led the way for the Golden Knights in the first matchup of the season, as the former netted a hat trick and the latter had a game-high four points. Dorofeyev has six goals in 10 career games played against the Kings, his most against any one opponent.

Storyline Of The Day – Playing Well Isn’t Enough
Two things can be true.

Thing 1 – The Kings played well enough to win Monday’s game against Dallas.
Thing 2 – We have reached a point in the season where good performances need to start resulting in victories more than they have.

It’s fine to say that the Kings played well enough to win that game, because I think anyone who watched the game would say that they did. But you can’t say that, after 45 games, without also acknowledging that at this stage in the season, the Kings need to start winning the games they play well in. Playing well doesn’t earn you any points in the standings. We’re 45 games into the season and three teams in the NHL have fewer wins than the Kings, who are on pace for fewer than 90 points this season.

I thought Drew Doughty tried to acknowledge both.

He’s one who always at least tries to own it when things aren’t going well. He had what felt like a moment of self-reflection, owning up to what he described as a “sore loser’s mentality” by saying that the Kings played well but didn’t get the bounces in a previous answer. It’s a variation we’ve heard many times this season. The Kings played well against Dallas. They probably deserved better. But 45 games into the season, the but needs to become an and. The Kings played well but they…… Time for “the Kings played well and they won.” That’s what needs to happen.

Jim Hiller has pointed to a stretch now from December 23 through the present as a few weeks of the way the Kings want to play. That includes games against Seattle, Colorado, Tampa Bay, Winnipeg and Dallas, which were all defeats. Over those 10 games, the Kings are 4-5-1, despite playing what they have felt has been much better hockey. And I won’t even argue with that. They have played better hockey. And yet, they are 4-5-1.

At some point, that record has to matter, because four wins out of 10 games, when you feel you’ve played well, cannot be considered good enough for this group. For a team that set the expectations that it did, it’s just not enough.

Doughty said that each day, the updated standings are printed out and available to look at within the locker room at Toyota Sports Performance Center. He said that he personally reads them each day. He is very aware of where the Kings are at right now. Most players are aware of the standings. The players have largely owned the losses this season, but the playing well narrative doesn’t land for a team that set expectations that aren’t being met, when the wins aren’t coming as a result of the play.

I thought that the Tampa Bay game a couple weeks back might’ve been the wake up call everyone needed. The Kings held a team meeting the day after that game as they fell out of a playoff position for the first time in a long time. Several players have referenced that meeting as an important one where everyone offered a little bit of honesty about where they were truly at as a team. Everyone seemed to believe it set the Kings on the right course. After two wins over Minnesota in the games that followed, it would’ve been hard to argue that it really helped.

At the time, I thought it was a really good thing for this team that they fell out of a playoff spot for a few days because it removed the layer of armor that they seemed to stand behind. Now, after losing three of four, it feels like that is back a bit. You can only fall out of a playoff spot and bounce back in so many times.

As we sit here this morning, the Kings are clinging to a playoff spot by points percentage and they are on the outside looking in by points. Perhaps a similar situation to get things going in the right direction. The Kings are playing better hockey than they have for the bulk of the season. Now, it’s time to turn that into wins, while acknowledging how important these points can be. With the division leaders in town tonight, that goes double.

3 To Watch For –
– On the day-to-day injury front, Jim Hiller shared that all three players who are currently out day-to-day hit the ice this morning. I saw forwards Joel Armia and Trevor Moore out there around an hour before the team was on the ice and Hiller indicated that Anze Kopitar also skated today.

“Nothing imminent” was the addition there from Hiller, meaning these guys aren’t playing tonight, but nonetheless it’s “nice to see people touch the ice.”

Joel Armia is on the ice this morning, getting some work in before the team takes the ice at 10:30. Has missed the last four games with an upper-body injury so it’s nice to see him getting closer!

Armia is out there with Trevor Moore, who has been skating.

— Zach Dooley (@DooleyLAK) January 14, 2026

Additionally, as noted above, Hiller shared that forward Corey Perry is not expected to play tonight as he returns home to attend to an illness in the family. Sending thoughts and well wishes his way as he deals with a difficult situation. No timeline on when Perry might be expected back, nor should one be asked for.

The Kings are not expected to practice tomorrow, so we’ll next get an update on where the injured trio is at before the Freeway Faceoff game in Los Angeles on Friday evening. What’s interesting right now is that the Kings are unlikely to practice until next week, so players coming back in could have to jump back in without a higher-intensity practice first, if they are ready to play against Anaheim. That’s the part of the season we’re at, so it could feel a bit sudden when guys do come back in, but it’s also just a ramification of the congested schedule right now, with tons of games and limited practice opportunity.

Will continue to share updates as they come.

– Without Perry, look to see some added minutes potentially for forward Taylor Ward, who has come up from the AHL and fit in nicely in a complementary role.

“They’ve been a huge help here, there’s been obviously a lot of bodies out of the lineup for us lately, those guys have done a great job,” forward Jeff Malott said of Ward and Andre Lee. “It’s awesome to see them work so hard, at the beginning of the season in Ontario and then having that transfer.”

Ward skated with Warren Foegele and Quinton Byfield during line rushes today, although with an 11/7 alignment, we will likely see a lot of guys move around the lineup. With Byfield, though, he’s typically the team’s preferred matchup centerman, meaning I think the Kings could want him to play against Jack Eichel’s line. With that in mind, the Kings might prefer some consistency in that spot.

There’s also something to be said for the consistency that Ward, Lee and Samuel Helenius have given as a line together, both against Edmonton and Dallas. Great splits for those three players in just shy of 17 minutes together, controlling the shot attempts, shots on goal and scoring chances by a wide margin.

“They’re really playing well, going back to Edmonton, they had shifts against Draisaitl, and the three of them, I know they had a really good run in the minors and we’re just really comfortable with them,” Hiller said. “I think Sammy’s game has come a ways, he looks stronger, faster and more confident, so we’re really comfortable with him. [Lee and Ward] have just played very well since coming back up, they look like they belong, so they’re pushing for competition when we get healthy of who is going to be in.”

I think you’ll see both things tonight. Those three guys will get shifts together and you’ll see Ward up with Byfield’s line as well. You’ll probably see Lee there too and potentially a few others. Part of the 11/7 look you get in those situations.

– Lastly, if there’s on area you’d like to see carry over from Dallas it’s the special teams.

Creates a challenge without Perry, who really just seems to bring the power play together, but his assist to Quinton Byfield on Monday made it seven goals from nine games played since the NHL’s Holiday Break, sixth-most in the league in that span.

The best way to kill penalties is simply by not taking them. The Kings took just one minor but it was negated by an embellishment call by Dallas forward Mikko Rantanen. Kings gave up a 5-on-3 goal in Edmonton but played really well otherwise. Especially with Armia and Moore out, it has put added stress on the Kings primary penalty killers, so limiting the minors and finding something on the power play is important, especially against one of the league’s best PP + PK teams in the NHL.

Division leaders are in the house tonight, as the Kings and Golden Knights square off. Will see many of you at Crypto.com Arena for the first LAKI night of the season! Looking forward to watching the game with you all, hoping the group can provide you with a better result than Monday!