Confident Kings Blank Blackhawks

It’s amazing what a little confidence can do for a team.

Just ask the Kings, who have suddenly become one of the hottest teams in the NHL after shutting out the Chicago Blackhawks, 3-0, Saturday afternoon to extend their unbeaten streak to a season-high seven games.

Before 16,005 at the Great Western Forum, the Kings outshot the Blackhawks, 38-21, and completely dominated both ends of the ice as they moved four games above .500 (23-19-9) for the first time this season.

Goaltender Stephane Fiset, who had missed his last start because of a thigh bruise, had to make only 21 saves in recording his second shutout of the season and 12th of his career.

Russ Courtnall got the Kings going early with an unassisted short-handed score midway through the first period, and Sandy Moger and Glen Murray each added second-period goals as the Kings defeated Chicago for the third consecutive time this season.

It was also the Kings’ second consecutive shutout against the Blackhawks. Goalie Jamie Storr won at Chicago, 1-0, in December and the Kings have now kept the Blackhawks scoreless for nearly 135 minutes.

“[Our confidence] is building in the right way, we’re not winning with lucky bounces or anything, we’re winning with hard work,” King defenseman Rob Blake said. “You have to credit the coaching staff because they haven’t let us slip at all through the seven games.”

The Kings, who haven’t lost since a 4-3 defeat against Edmonton on Jan. 10, are 7-2-2 over their last 11 games and lead the Blackhawks by four points for sixth place in the Western Conference. The victory also improved the Kings to 7-1-1 over their last nine games at home and to 17-1-1 when they score first.

“We came out real hard and we were well prepared,” said Courtnall, who played a key role for the Kings’ fast start and is becoming more of an offensive force. “We knew what we wanted to do . . . we wanted to get the puck in deep, play along the walls and take it to the net.”

The Kings already had seven shots on goal before Chicago launched its first against Fiset nearly eight minutes into the game. Ironically, the Kings scored their first goal with their penalty-killing unit on the ice.

With teammate Ian Laperriere playing nearly the entire shift without a stick, Courtnall stole the puck from the Blackhawks’ Chris Chelios and then skated into the Chicago zone before beating goalie Andrei Trefilov--who started in place of Jeff Hackett--with his 25th career short-handed goal from the left circle at 11:31 of the first period.

With a 1-0 lead, the Kings continued to physically take the game to the Blackhawks, including a brawl won by the Kings’ Matt Johnson over Chicago enforcer Jim Cummins.

“It’s always an aggressive game when we play Chicago,” Courtnall said. “From their smallest guy to their biggest, they always take the body.

“[But] when we’re playing that style of hockey, we’re at our best.”

Chicago began the second period with a man advantage but the Kings’ defense held the Blackhawks without any solid scoring chances. Their two defensive-minded lines of Nathan LaFayette, Dan Bylsma and Courtnall, and Laperriere, Sandy Moger and Johnson were able to frustrate Chicago’s two U.S. Olympians in Tony Amonte--who had scored six goals in his last six games against the Kings--and Chelios.

The Kings needed less than three minutes to add two insurance goals against Trefilov, who was playing in only his fifth game this season with the Blackhawks.

Defenseman Doug Zmolek made a nice play to keep the puck in Chicago’s zone, which led to Johnson and Laperriere’s assists on Moger’s seventh goal of the season at 3:15 of the second period.

Jozef Stumpel triggered the Kings’ third goal when he pressured Chicago’s Jean-Yves Leroux into a turnover in his own zone. Murray picked up the loose puck and then made it look easy when he slid the puck into the net with a backhand at 5:54.

Fiset faced only six shots in the final period.