10/26 DEFINITION – Kings 3, Utah Hockey Club 2

The Kings played their second home game of the season on Saturday as they welcomed the NHL’s newest franchise, the Utah Hockey Club, to town. In what was the first-ever NHL regular season game between the two clubs, meeting for the first of three times this season, with another home game and a trip to Salt Lake City on the schedule.

The shadows of Thursday’s game seemingly emerged on Saturday as the Kings took home a 3-2 victory and faced a trailing visiting team trying to fight their way back into the game. Just like Thursday, the Kings had a strong first period, but this time they were unable to find the back of the net and went scoreless through the first 20 minutes.

Enter period two and the king’s attack arrived. Late in a power play, Brandt Clarke demonstrated his elite agility, blasting a wrist shot through traffic that ultimately found its way off a Utah stick and into the net. A handful of minutes later, Joel Edmundson scored his first goal with the Kings by crashing the Utah net and putting the loose puck over the goal line with 6:50 left in the period. The Kings’ 2-0 lead lasted 2:45 when Utah’s newly appointed captain Clayton Keller ripped his own wrist shot through traffic as a Kings penalty expired, cutting the deficit in half.

The Kings took a 2-1 lead into the final period and it took just 1:09 for the good guys to extend their lead back to two. Edmundson scored his second goal of the game and scored his first two-goal game in the NHL in career game 537. Another point shot through traffic found its way past Utah’s Connor Ingram to give the Kings a 3–2 lead . With a couple of goals ahead, the King’s lead was halved again midway through the period. Rising star Logan Cooley knocked a pass from another rising star, Dylan Guenther, into the front of the net to tighten the score. From there, the Kings defense held tight and helped Darcy Kuemper get his first home win of the season.

Kuemper, who returned to the fold for the Kings after suffering a lower-body injury in Ottawa earlier this season, stopped 23 of 25 shots. Kuemper now has a record of 2-0-2.