Finally a Full Team

Playing short-handed certainly wasn’t a problem for the Kings last season, when they led the NHL in penalty killing.

That hasn’t been the case lately. After 26 games, the Kings rank 14th with an 83.8% success rate, and have given up four power-play goals in their last two games against Columbus and Nashville.

But with players returning from injury-caused absences, improvement may be on the way.

“We’re finally back to using the same personnel that we used last year,” Coach Andy Murray said. “We can now pair C.J. [Craig Johnson] and Smoke [Bryan Smolinski]; [Eric] Belanger and [Ian] Laperriere together, and [Adam] Deadmarsh and [Ziggy] Palffy. That was the group we had last year.”

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After tonight’s game at Nashville, the Kings will play six of their next seven against teams with .500 or better records. But because the Kings are playing the same Predator team that handed them a 3-2 defeat at Staples Center last week, they know they can’t be caught looking ahead.

“We need a real sense of urgency right now,” Murray said. “We have to get points right now. We can’t wait five, six, seven games for guys to get back and to get comfortable with each other again. We lost some points at home.”

TONIGHT

At Nashville, 5 PST, Fox Sports Net

Site -- Gaylord Entertainment Center.

Radio -- KSPN (1110).

Records -- Kings 10-9-4-3, Predators 6-13-4-4.

Record vs. Predators -- 1-1-0-0.

Update -- Tomas Vokoun made 19 saves in Nashville’s victory last Thursday and the Kings needed an overtime goal from defenseman Jaroslav Modry for a 6-5 win on Nov. 3.