KNOCKED DOWN, NOT OUT : Mullen, Run Over by Baumgartner, Returns to Light Flames in Third Period

For the longest time Saturday night, the Calgary Flames refused to say what was the matter with Joe Mullen, who was run over late in the first period by King defenseman Ken Baumgartner.

Mullen provided the answer in the third period: Not much.

Mullen, who spent the second period in the locker room, returned to assist on the fourth goal and score the fifth as the Flames withstood a late rally by the Kings to win, 5-2, at the Forum.

“I got my head back together and felt like I could contribute,” said Mullen, who complained of dizziness and a sore jaw.

Had Baumgartner deliberately tried to injure Mullen? “You seen it,” he said. “What do you think?”

Cliff Fletcher saw it, too, and didn’t have any doubts. “It was a real cheap shot,” said the Flames’ general manager. “That’s the way (Baumgartner) plays. He isn’t good enough to play in the International League. I guess he did his job. He put a good hockey player out of the game for two periods. He gave him a stick right in the jaw and knocked him out.”

Actually, Mullen said, “I don’t think I was out, but I really don’t remember the whole play.”

He returned to the bench midway through the third period. “The doctor said I know my body better than anybody else and that if I felt like I could go out and play, and I wasn’t dizzy or off-balance or anything, I could go out and play,” he said.

His teammates applauded his grit. “He showed a lot of heart to come back,” said Joel Otto, whose first-period goal gave the Flames a 2-0 lead a few minutes before Mullen was knocked out of the game. “He’s got a lot of spunk.”

Mullen, who led the Flames and established a record for a U.S.-born player with 110 points in the regular season, has had previous run-ins with Baumgartner this season. And with other so-called “enforcers.”

“Mullen is our Gretzky,” Otto said. “He’s a big part of our team and he’s taken runs like that all season.”

Said Mullen, who had 21 points against the Kings in the regular season: “It’s not like I don’t expect it out there. You expect to get hit.”

But Baumgartner, the Flames suggested, went too far. “Is there any question whether it was a cheap shot?” Jim Peplinski asked a reporter. “In your mind, is there?”

Jerry Buss took his regular seat in the upper deck behind the north goal Saturday night, seemingly portending doom for the Kings.

According to Buss, they fare better when he stays away.

In 1982, when he still owned the team, Buss was on his way home, listening on the radio, when the Kings produced the still-ballyhooed “Miracle on Manchester,” their magical rally from a 5-0 third-period deficit to a 6-5 overtime playoff victory over the Edmonton Oilers.

And then, last week, the owner of the Lakers and the Forum watched on television from a seat in the Forum Club as the Kings eliminated the Oilers from the playoffs and ended Edmonton’s reign as Stanley Cup champions.

“I missed them on purpose,” Buss said of the two most memorable moments in the Kings’ mostly forgettable history. “I’m very superstitious, just like the players who grow those beards in the playoffs. I have this feeling that if I’m outside of the building, or I’m not watching in person and we go ahead, I don’t like to change my position.”

Buss, though, stayed put as the Flames jumped on the Kings early and took some of the life out of a sellout crowd of 16,005.

And he was still in his seat as the Flames wrapped up a 5-2 win that gave them a 3-0 lead in the best-of-seven Smythe Division final.

Buss was in the parking lot seven years ago when rookie Doug Smith scored on a rebound of a shot by Mark Hardy at 5 minutes 58 seconds of the third period, cutting the Kings’ deficit against the Oilers to 5-2.

“My driver said, ‘Shall we go back?’ ” Buss recalled. “I said, ‘No, that would jinx it. This is just absolutely perfect. Let’s keep driving.’ And then we scored the third goal and the fourth goal and the fifth goal and then (at 2:35 of overtime) the sixth goal.”

At the time, Buss told a reporter: “I thought our only chance was if I left . . . I’ve watched every game to completion and I thought the one game I left would be the miracle of all time, but only if I left.”

Actually, he said Saturday, he was on his way to a banquet.

His absence at such a critical juncture was often used as an example of his perceived disinterest in the Kings.

But Buss, who sold the team to Bruce McNall 13 months ago, said the Kings’ abysmal record was a source of frustration.

Their success this season, he said, delighted him.

“I’m as excited as any other fan,” he said. “Firstly, I think any sports owner is a fan of the game, and I’m still a fan.

“When the ‘Miracle on Manchester’ came around, you could sense that if you ever gave the hockey fans something to cheer about, they would really come out in droves, as they are doing now.”