Devils Give Sluggish Kings a Real Dose This Time, 6-1

Now, these were the New Jersey Devils who won the Stanley Cup.

Not that bunch that played the Kings earlier this month in East Rutherford.

And these were the Kings who watched last summer on television.

Not that bunch that beat New Jersey less than three weeks ago.

Two goals by John Madden, power-play scores by Peter Sykora and Randy McKay, and third-period goals by Scott Gomez and Alexander Mogilny were more than enough for the Devils in their 6-1 victory Thursday night before an announced 13,451 at Staples Center.

The Devils took advantage of a few breaks, forechecked as if their paychecks were on the ice in the Kings’ end and got the kind of goaltending that makes Martin Brodeur among the league’s best.

Turn that 180 degrees, and you have the Kings, whose unbeaten string ran out at 6-0-2.

It was their first loss in November, and it’s as badly as they have played since a 7-1 debacle in St. Louis barely more than a month ago.

“We’ve played some pretty good games in the last series of games,” said Coach Andy Murray, acknowledging as much as he will the Kings’ unbeaten streak.

“But we’ve also played some games that weren’t as good, and that’s been what we’ve emphasized the last few days [in practice]. If the message was lost, it was sent to us tonight.”

New Jersey got one too. Signing holdouts Jason Arnott and Scott Niedermayer earlier in the week did more than merely make the Devil roster complete.

“It changes our tempo,” Coach Larry Robinson said. “We’ve got guys back playing with the guys they’re supposed to, and it’s taken some of the pressure off Scotty [Gomez] and [Brian Rafalski].”

Gomez added two assists to his goal, and Rafalski assisted on the score by McKay.

The change in tempo was clear quickly.

“They showed you the speed they’ve got,” said King goalie Jamie Storr, who started for the 14th consecutive time and struggled more than he has in a month.

“They sneak in behind the defense, get the puck and they’re gone.”

It’s how the Devils tied the score and set the pace for the rest of the game.

The Kings owned a 1-0 lead when Luc Robitaille, loitering near the net, tipped in a shot by Mathieu Schneider, who had taken a power-play pass from Ziggy Palffy only a second after a two-man King advantage had run out.

It was their high-water mark.

Penalty killing has been a struggle for the Kings for much of the season, and seldom more so than when Sykora steamed down the middle of the ice and took a pass from Patrik Elias on a power play only 50 seconds after Robitaille’s goal.

Sykora had beaten Mattias Norstrom, Elias had beaten Rob Blake and only Storr was left to beat.

The struggle for Storr, who has given up 10 goals in the last two games after an 18-goals-in-10-games run, began with Sykora’s goal, which tied things at 12:07.

McKay’s goal, at 14:13, also came on a power play and gave New Jersey the lead for good. He beat Nelson Emerson to a rebound of Rafalski’s shot and batted it home.

The deluge began early in the second period, when Madden sent a shot goalward from the boards to Storr’s left and well toward the blue line. The puck glanced off Steve Reinprecht’s leg and past those of Storr to make it 3-1.

“I might have been a little too upright, but I can’t go down in front of a shot that’s going to the corner,” Storr said.

Only the absence of a white flag prevented a complete King surrender thereafter.

“We didn’t play well defensively after that,” Murray acknowledged.

Or on offense, for that matter.

Murray showed his displeasure through ice time. Palffy, the league’s leader with 29 points coming into the game, played one shift in the third period, as did linemate Jozef Stumpel, who had scored the game-winning goal when the Kings beat New Jersey, 2-1, on Nov. 4.

“This wasn’t a very good measuring stick,” Murray said. “A lot of our key guys didn’t play very well. . . . And [the Devils are] playing better than they were before.”

They’re playing like defending Stanley Cup champions, and on Thursday night, the Kings played like a team that was watching the Devils hoist that Cup from television at home.

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