Kings Start Fast, but Sabres Have Finishing Power

The calm but frustrated expression on Coach Larry Robinson’s face said it all about the Kings’ 6-2 loss to the Buffalo Sabres on Friday night.

After watching his team turn a 2-0 first-period lead into its third consecutive defeat and 11th in its last 15 games, Robinson did not have much to say. But he tried anyway.

“We started exactly the way we wanted to . . . we got up 2-0 . . . Buffalo was frustrated and they had nowhere to go. Everything was going our way,” Robinson said. “Then [the King players] had the idea that they wanted to do things their way, and then it’s 2-2 and we never recovered.”

With Brian Holzinger and Derek Plante each scoring two goals, the Sabres scored six consecutive goals, including five against King goalie Stephane Fiset--to win their third game in a row, before 15,702 at Marine Midland Arena.

In an attempt to end the losing streak, Robinson made a couple of lineup changes. On one line, Vladimir Tsyplakov was teamed with Ray Ferraro and Brad Smyth, and on another, Dimitri Khristich joined Eddie Olcyzk and Brent Grieve.

The Kings’ main problem, however, was that they tried to play an aggressive checking style like Buffalo without enforcer Matt Johnson, who had returned to Los Angeles after suffering a right-shoulder strain against the New York Rangers on Wednesday.

“We had a good game plan and that’s how we played for the first 10 minutes,” King defenseman Philippe Boucher said. “We knew their game. It’s not the coaches because we knew what we had to do.”

After being shut out for the sixth time this season in a 4-0 loss to the Rangers, the Kings scored early against the Sabres. Tsyplakov set up the first goal when he stole the puck from Buffalo’s Darryl Shannon and passed to Ferraro outside the left post. With goalie Dominik Hasek out of position, Ferraro scored his team-high 13th goal at the 7:55 mark.

Less than two minutes later, the Kings caught a break for their second goal. Defenseman John Slaney was credited with the score when a pass intended for Dan Bylsma deflected off a skate of Sabre defenseman Bob Boughner into the net to give the Kings a 2-0 lead.

That’s when the Sabres started to get physical. Over the last 10 minutes of the period, Buffalo instigated three fights and the game’s momentum changed.

Without Johnson to keep the pesky Sabres in check, Barry Potomski, Ian Laperriere, Kevin Stevens and Grieve did their best, but they were overmatched and the Sabres rallied to tie the score before the end of the first period.

Holzinger scored Buffalo’s first goal 12:22 into the period after the Kings had failed to clear the puck out of their zone, and Matthew Barnaby got the equalizer with a breakaway goal at 17:53.

With the score still tied, 2-2, midway through the second period, Laperriere was roughed up in front of the Kings’ bench by Boughner. But just as Mattias Norstrom came to Laperriere’s aid, the Sabres’ Donald Audette picked up a loose puck in the neutral zone and scored on a breakaway at 8:09.

After that, the game was basically over as the increasingly fragile Kings began to press without much luck against Hasek, who improved to 17-12-2.

“They just started to win all of the battles,” King defenseman Rob Blake said about the Sabres’ comeback. “At first we were dumping the puck in and going after them. Then, we stopped doing that and they took it to us.”

The Sabres put the game away in the final 2 1/2 minutes of regulation with Holzinger’s second score and two goals by Plante, including one into an empty net.