Kings finally break the ice, beating Penguins in overtime

And so, Trevor Lewis, Matt Greene and Nic Dowd led the Kings out of the darkness, out of the scoreless abyss.

Just like everyone thought, right?

The Kings scored for the first time in a week and added two more goals for good measure, beating the reigning Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins, 3-2, in overtime Thursday night at Staples Center.

It was a noteworthy result on another level: the 600th regular-season win for Kings Coach Darryl Sutter. Sutter started his NHL head coaching career with the Chicago Blackhawks in the 1992-93 season.

This season, Sutter’s team has yet to win in regulation. The Kings have won four games in overtime and needed a shootout in their other victory.

Dowd, alone in front, had the winner at 2 minutes 37 seconds of overtime, deking Penguins goalie Marc-Andre Fleury twice, after a nice feed from left wing Tanner Pearson.

“Going scoreless in three games hurts,” Dowd said in his post-game television interview. “Just happy I got the puck over to Marty [Alec Martinez], and Marty made a real good play and Tanner made a good play to me in the slot and gave me a chance to get a shot on goal.”

Said Sutter: “On our team, we’re trying to get him [Dowd] to be a solid third-line centerman. We know who the first two are.”

For the Kings, it was their first victory in four games. They had matched a franchise mark, set in the 1968-69 season, by failing to score in three consecutive games.

Sidney Crosby led Pittsburgh with two goals. Crosby and the Penguins took advantage of a rare miscue by Kings defenseman Drew Doughty in his own zone in the third period. Pittsburgh defenseman Kris Letang picked off Doughty’s clearing attempt and found Crosby in front of goalie Peter Budaj. Crosby, who scored with a deft redirection at 9:28 of the third period to tie it, 2-2, has six goals in five games this season.

“We marvel at him sometimes — with how good he is and what he does,” Penguins Coach Mike Sullivan said. “He’s a threat most every shift. He’s playing inspired hockey right now.”

Said Crosby: “Just tight hockey. They’re comfortable playing that way. They’re always pretty stingy, especially at home. That’s the kind of the game you expect. You don’t accept it. You want to get chances. You want to generate, but not if it means giving up things the other way.”

Lewis broke the long scoring drought for the Kings with a fluke goal, which went in off the stick of Fleury, at 5:25 of the second period, tying it, 1-1. “It was good to get that first goal,” Lewis said. “We came back a couple times there and it was awesome to see the resilience and character of this group.”

Even the Kings Twitter feed had some good-natured fun with the end of the scoring drought, which lasted for 205 minutes and 25 seconds.

Jeff Carter had helped put the Kings ahead, 2-1, at 2:14 of the third period, winning the draw cleanly back to Greene at the right point. It was Greene’s first goal since March of the 2014-15 season.

The Kings were without one of their dependable defensemen as Tom Gilbert drew a three-game suspension, the NHL’s Department of Player Safety announced. He was suspended for boarding Ducks forward Nick Ritchie in Tuesday’s game between the Kings and Anaheim.

The Kings placed forward Andy Andreoff on injured reserve and called up defenseman Kevin Gravel from their minor league affiliate in Ontario.

lisa.dillman@latimes.com