Kings Go the Extra Mile to Win

OK, now they have this overtime business down.

The Kings are hot. So hot that they earned their first overtime win of the season with a goal from an unlikely source, scored in an unlikely way Monday night in beating Calgary, 4-3, after squandering a two-goal lead in the third period before 14,455 at Staples Center.

The source was Sean O’Donnell, whose goal was his second of the season, and it came when he took a pass from Ziggy Palffy in front of Calgary goalie Fred Brathwaite and shot a puck off the right skate of Flame defenseman Clarke Wilm at 1:42.

It was the Kings’ first win in the NHL’s new four-on-four overtime format, and they have had 11 tries to earn it.

The win also moved the Kings into sixth place in the conference standings, ahead of Edmonton and San Jose.

If ever a team was ripe for a letdown, it was the Kings, riding high with four wins in their last five games and playing Calgary, winless in its last eight on the Kings’ home ice.

After a goal by Palffy and two by Luc Robitaille, it seemed that form would hold.

And then form took a beating.

Third-period goals by Phil Housley and Jarome Iginla earned the Flames a 3-3 tie.

Robitaille’s goals sent him rocketing past his childhood idol in Montreal, Maurice Richard, on the all-time NHL goal list with 545.

He also added an assist on Palffy’s goal in the first period that gave the Kings a 1-0 lead.

The three points gave Robitaille 1,126, tied with Mike Bossy for 35th on the all-time list.

Palffy’s goal, at 1:51, came when Jozef Stumpel was served a puck in open ice and whirled and fired at Robitaille, who sent it between the legs of Calgary’s Robyn Regehr to Palffy, who merely had to redirect it into an open net.

It became 2-0 when Palffy passed to Stumpel, who sent it under a stick to Robitaille, who also had an open net.

Calgary got one of the goals back when Marc Savard took advantage of a King defensive lapse and sent a puck ahead to Iginla, who had King goalie Jamie Storr at his mercy to cut things to 2-1 with his first of two goals.

It was left to Robitaille to counter that, which he did in the second period by rebounding a Rob Blake shot off the back wall.

Calgary goalie Fred Brathwaite had gone out to field Blake’s shot, which went past him and left the net open for Robitaille.

But as occasionally has happened this season, the Kings couldn’t handle prosperity.

Their lead was cut to 3-2 when, with Glen Murray in the penalty box, Housley redirected a shot by Valeri Bure into the net for a power-play goal at 5:43 of the third period.

Only 52 seconds later, Iginla tied the score, 3-3, by redirecting a shot by Andrei Nazarov past King defenseman Garry Galley and Storr.

Things got wild and woolly in the third period when the Flames started banging away at Storr, who had dealt with only 12 shots in the first 40 minutes.

He faced 11 in the third period.

And after dragging themselves into oblivion while wasting their two-goal lead, they shot the puck 19 times in the final period, each time fruitlessly.

Brathwaite was equal to each, including turning back Bryan Smolinski on a 15-foot shot on a breakaway with 1:35 to play.

Calgary posed the league’s most severe threat in overtime, with 10 wins in 15 tries, best in the league. But the Flames came up short Monday night, and the Kings have become a more complete team, with knowledge that they can play in overtime after all.

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DUCKS 4, CHICAGO 3

Trailing for most of the game, Kip Miller and Ted Donato scored third-period goals and Anaheim pulled out a victory over the Blackhawks. Page 3

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FLICKERING FLAMES: Weakened by injuries to their most experienced defensemen, Calgary’s season is quickly unraveling, ruining what was a promising start. Helene Elliott’s column. Page 3