Kings finish rough trip with win over Flyers
PHILADELPHIA -- Adrian Kempe and Tyler Toffoli scored third-period goals, and the Los Angeles Kings leaned heavily on their top-ranked penalty kill in a 4-1 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers on Monday night.
Alec Martinez and Trevor Lewis also scored for the Kings, and Jonathan Quick turned aside 36 shots as Los Angeles (21-10-4) ended a four-game road trip with a win, snapping a three-game losing streak.
Jakub Voracek scored the lone goal for the Flyers (14-12-7), who had their six-game win streak snapped.
Brian Elliott (21 saves) took the loss, his first defeat since Dec. 2.
The Kings killed off five of the Flyers' six power plays. Los Angeles entered the game ranked first in the NHL with an 86.7 percent success rate.
The game turned in the third period, when Kempe netted his 11th goal of the season for a 3-1 lead at 4:48. The Flyers pressured Quick on an ensuing power play, but the Kings stormed back to put the game away at 15:31 on Toffoli's 16th goal of the season, one behind team leader Anze Kopitar.
Just as they did two nights earlier in a 4-3 overtime loss in Brooklyn, the Kings opened up a 2-0 lead on first-period goals by Martinez and Lewis.
Martinez's third of the season came 5:27 into the game off a faceoff win by Torrey Mitchell, who cleanly beat Scott Laughton and drove the net for a screen. It was Martinez's first goal in 20 games since Nov. 4.
Lewis made it 2-0 at 16:46 of the first, beating Elliott past his catching glove on a nice feed from center Nick Shore. It was Lewis' eighth goal of the season and first in 12 games.
The Flyers had a pair of power plays in the opening period and converted with 1:56 remaining to draw within 2-1. Claude Giroux's shot was blocked by Drew Doughty, and the puck went directly to Voracek. The NHL assists leader one-timed a shot past Quick for his eighth goal of the season and second on the power play.
It was the sixth straight game in which the Kings surrendered a power-play goal.
NOTES: Los Angeles D Christian Folin left the game with an upper-body injury after the first period and did not return. ... Kings RW Dustin Brown played in his 999th NHL game. The hard-hitting 33-year-old veteran has been incredibly durable in his NHL career, missing just 17 games over the past 14 seasons. ... Los Angeles LW Andy Andreoff returned to the lineup after sitting out the previous 10 games. He played on a fourth line with C Torrey Mitchell and RW Johnny Brodzinski, who sat out the previous two games. ... Before the game, Flyers G Brian Elliott was named NHL's second star of the week. ... The Flyers played their 23rd game against a Western Conference opponent, the most by any Eastern Conference team.