Robinson Gets Graphic About Offensive Woes

The message went out Saturday morning at the Great Western Forum, accompanied by a graphic and followed by reinforcement.

The Kings are 2-1 going into tonight’s game against Colorado, but they aren’t working hard enough. Two goals a game just isn’t going to do it.

“We can’t depend on Steph to stand on his head every night and make saves,” Coach Larry Robinson said of goalie Stephane Fiset.

The graphic showed a shot chart, with places on the ice from which the shots originated, and the jersey numbers of the King shooters. The dangerous area, Robinson said, is close to the goal, where pucks can be tipped or rebounded into the net. You have to do a lot of pushing and shoving to get into that area and stay there. You have to do a lot of pushing and shoving to win pucks, so practice Saturday included drills to demonstrate that.

Absent on the chart were the numbers 27, 15 and 9.

That’s 27, winger Glen Murray; 15, center Jozef Stumpel; and 9, Vladimir Tsyplakov. None has scored in a season in which all six goals have come from the line of Luc Robitaille, Yanic Perreault and Josh Green, or from the penalty-killing unit, with Perreault scoring twice short-handed.

“We’re not in a panic stage yet, but, yeah, we’d like to get a goal in the first period to get our line going,” said Murray, the team’s leading goal scorer last season with 29. “There’s no excuse. We’ve had a few chances, but . . . we can’t feel sorry for ourselves. We just have to work harder.”

*

King center Roman Vopat, after being scratched from the season’s first three games and spending a lot of conditioning time on a stationary bicycle: “I feel like I’m training for the Tour de France.”

TONIGHT

vs. Colorado

5 p.m., Fox Sports West 2

* Site--Great Western Forum.

* Radio--KRLA (1110).

* Records--Kings 2-1, Avalanche 0-4.

* Record vs. Avalanche (1997-98)--4-1.

* Update--Center Joe Sakic (27 goals, 63 points last season) has three of the Avalanche’s five goals, and also has two assists. Colorado’s Keith Jones is coming off a two-game suspension for hitting Buffalo’s Curtis Brown in the head in a game Monday.