McNall Rips Kings After Loss : Hockey: Owner says he will make some moves after his team loses for the sixth time in seven games, falling to the Sabres, 4-2.

Bruce McNall was mad. Mad enough to publicly blast his players. Mad enough to start looking for new players.

“The party’s over,” he told reporters Tuesday night after watching his club lose to the Buffalo Sabres, 4-2. “My patience is over. I’ve about had it. We are going to make some moves and they won’t be small. I’ll tell you that.

“There are no untouchables on this team except No. 99, and he got sold twice in his life,” McNall said, referring to Wayne Gretzky. “After that, anything’s possible. I guess you could make a case for any trade being made, but the way I feel right now, anyone can go except for 99.”

Tuesday’s loss was the Kings’ second in a row and sixth in their last seven games, a string broken only by a tie last Thursday against Edmonton.

“We are not going to give anything away,” McNall said. “We have to look at what we need. But this is not fair to the fans.

“We’ll have some meetings during the All-Star break. Either the players will decide to perform or they’ll perform somewhere else.”

McNall was quick to shield his coach, Tom Webster.

“I don’t think the coach is the problem,” he said. “The coach is always the easiest target. I thought going into the season, we had the right team. So it comes back to the owner. Maybe we don’t have the right chemistry or the right players. But I don’t think the coach is the problem. Something’s not right. This is a total team failure.

“I’m becoming the George Steinbrenner of hockey. I’m more like a fan. I tend to react the way they do. They are the ones who are ultimately paying the players. So if they are not happy, I guess my job is to do what a fan would do.”

Stuck in fourth place in the Smythe Division, four points out of third, the Kings had a chance to make a move in the standings Tuesday when all the other Smythe clubs except Calgary lost.

But so did the Kings, despite outshooting Buffalo, 35-22, including 14-5 in the final period.

The Kings entered that period down, 3-2, and that’s the way it stayed until the closing seconds.

Webster had pulled goalie Kelly Hrudey with little over a minute to play.

In the final seconds, Christian Ruuttu fired the puck from the red line at the empty net.

King defenseman Steve Duchesne tried to catch up to the sliding puck. It had bounced off a post and come to a rest perhaps an inch from the goal line.

But Duchesne, furiously skating into the net, inadvertently kicked the puck across with only six seconds to play, giving Ruuttu his eighth goal.

There were three power-play opportunities in the first period, two of them for the Kings, but still no score entering the final two minutes.

Gretzky changed that by digging the puck off the boards on the right side and passing it to Duchesne at the base of the left circle.

From there, at the 18:41 mark, Duchesne drilled home his 12th goal of the season. Buffalo goalie Daren Puppa seemed to be caught flat-footed, failing to react as the puck sailed over his right shoulder into the net.

The assist extended Gretzky’s point-scoring streak to 13 games. It was his 69th assist and 93rd point, both league-leading totals.

The period ended with each team taking nine shots on goal.

Having only one shot on goal in their first two power plays, the Kings got another opportunity when Buffalo’s Uwe Krupp was given two minutes for hooking. That is, seven seconds are considered an opportunity.

That is how long the Kings’ advantage lasted before Luc Robitaille was called for roughing.

Back on equal terms, Buffalo proved more than equal.

Phil Housley passed to winger Alexander Mogilny, who ended up one-on-one against the Kings’ Hrudey. Mogilny faked the forehand before putting in the puck backhanded at 2:14 for his 10th goal.

Having awakened, it didn’t take the Sabres long to rattle again. Only 13 seconds later, still in the four-on-four situation, Buffalo scored another goal to take a 2-1 lead.

The puck was stolen from Mikko Makela. Dave Andreychuk passed to Housley who hit a slap shot past Hrudey’s glove for his 14th goal.

Buffalo increased its lead at 13:14 when Andreychuk dug a puck out from the endboards and passed it to Ray Sheppard, who was waiting by the left post to shove it in for his second goal of the season. It was also his second in two games after going scoreless in his first nine.

Housley also had an assist on the play, giving him three points Tuesday and 16 points in his last 11 games. Housley, already third in assists on Buffalo’s all-time list, has 33 assists this season and 11 in his last 11 games.

Gretzky made the game close when Buffalo defenseman Doug Bodger tried to push the puck out of his own zone from the boards on the right side. Bodger fanned on his shot, giving Gretzky an opening.

He took it, and the puck, moving into the slot where he fired home his 25th goal at 13:57.

But it wasn’t enough, sending McNall into his rage.

Frustrated, the King owner keeps changing his seat, trying to change his luck.

“I may sit on the scoreboard next,” he joked. “Maybe I can change the score.”

And how does he take out his frustrations during the game?

“Tonight I had a high-powered rifle,” he said, kidding again. “I adjusted the scope but I couldn’t get a shot off.

“Just like my players.”

King Notes

The Kings have 16 sellouts at the Forum this season, including a franchise record nine in a row, a string that ended early in December. . . . Buffalo’s six-game losing streak was one short of the club record. . . . A weekend off in the middle of the season? That’s what all but four of the Kings will enjoy after Thursday’s home stand finale against the Detroit Red Wings. Because the All-Star game in Pittsburgh is being shown on NBC, it has been moved from its customary midweek spot to Sunday. Four Kings--Wayne Gretzky, Luc Robitaille, Bernie Nicholls and Steve Duchesne--will play in the game. King defenseman Tom Laidlaw twisted his right knee in the second period and did not return.