Blake Sends Out All-Points Bulletin

Practice was late Thursday. Rob Blake had some things to get off his chest.

One of them was an arithmetic lesson.

“We play San Jose twice before the end of the season and that’s four points,” Blake, the team’s captain, said. “We’re seven points behind [the Sharks for the eighth and final Western Conference playoff spot], and if we can win one game more than them and beat them twice, then it’s a one-point difference.”

The idea was to try to put the season’s last 17 games in the best possible light, to use the Kings’ 4-2 win over Detroit on Tuesday night as a jumping-off spot to a playoff run.

But not to make more of that game than it was.

“Sure, we beat a defending Stanley Cup champion, but we got outshot and Steph [Stephane Fiset, the King goalie] stood on his head to save us,” Blake said. “And we took eight minutes of penalties in the third period. You’re not going to take eight minutes of penalties in the third and beat a lot of teams.”

The idea is that there shouldn’t be a letdown before Saturday’s game against Vancouver.

“To have a letdown, I think you really have to have something going,” Blake said. “One game isn’t going anywhere.”

The timing was curious, the victory over Detroit having followed miserable performances in losses to Nashville and Calgary. Blake, who had never called a similar meeting, would not say what he told the Kings but others said there was a demand for unity, responsibility and accountability. A Monday practice at which six players were fined $100 each for being late might well have prompted some of Blake’s sermon.

“It’s probably 50 games too late,” he said. “We win a game, but we . . . didn’t move anywhere in the standings [because San Jose and Edmonton won]. . . . I hope it’s not too late.”

The importance of the meeting rests in the soft-spoken Blake calling it.

“Blakie’s our leader,” Ian Laperriere said. “When he talks, you listen. Guys like that, when he speaks, you stop what you’re doing and listen.

“It was like Blakie said, that was a great win over Detroit, but we didn’t just win the Cup. It doesn’t mean [a thing] if we still lose again.”

For Blake, it was a matter of nothing ventured, nothing gained.

“It’s not going to hurt anything,” he said. “What else can go wrong? Staples Center catch on fire?”

It did on Monday.

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The flu-ridden Kings are fighting back with antibiotics and decongestants. A few players have missed practices but no games have been lost because of the illness.