Potvin Stops Shooting Stars

Putting their weekend misadventures behind them, Ziggy Palffy and the Kings boldly resumed their NHL duties Monday night.

Palffy, who touched off an international incident Saturday with his participation in an Olympic preliminary-round game in Salt Lake City, scored the winning goal with 6:40 to play and the Kings defeated the Dallas Stars, 2-1, in front of a sellout crowd of 18,118 at Staples Center.

The Kings, who squandered a four-goal lead in a 6-5 overtime loss to the Phoenix Coyotes on Friday night, also got a first-period goal from Adam Deadmarsh and a brilliant performance from goaltender Felix Potvin.

Potvin, after giving up a season-high six goals in a lackluster performance against the Coyotes, made a season-high 32 saves, his shutout bid ending only when center Pierre Turgeon scored on a tip-in with 36 seconds to play.

Palffy was back in the King lineup after spending the weekend in Utah, where on Saturday he had surprised the Kings by playing for Slovakia, against their wishes, in a 3-0 loss to Germany.

Less than 24 hours earlier, Palffy had scored three goals at Phoenix, registering his first hat trick since November 2000, but the Kings had coughed up a 4-0 second-period lead and suffered a disheartening lost.

By Monday, Palffy had been forgiven--the Kings blamed Slovak team executives and not the all-star winger, who sat out his previously approved Sunday night commitment to his countrymen after the Kings had expressed their displeasure with his unauthorized Saturday appearance.

And the loss to the Coyotes, while not forgiven, at least had been forgotten, King Coach Andy Murray said.

“Every game that comes, whether good things happen in the game or bad things, I think you move on from that and go into the next game,” Murray said before Monday night’s game.

“It’s all coaching rhetoric and cliches after you’ve had a big win to say, ‘We’re on the right track,’ or, ‘This will be the big turnaround for us.’ That only happens based on how you play the games after that....

“To read anything else into situations, I think you’re setting yourself up. If I was to say, ‘This could be an omen for bad things to happen,’ that’s probably what would happen. I would prefer to say it’s a one-game affair.”

The Palffy situation, he said, was “no distraction at all.”

The Stars, though, presented a challenge, even if their disappointing season had led to the Jan. 25 firing of Coach Ken Hitchcock. The Stars, 2-3-1 under interim Coach Rick Wilson, a former King assistant, already had defeated the Kings twice, 2-1 at Dallas on Oct. 9 and 4-3 at Staples Center on Nov. 15.

“There aren’t many holes in their lineup,” Murray said.

Deadmarsh, who had a career-high four assists against the Coyotes, found the hole between the legs of Star goaltender Ed Belfour with 3:18 to play in the first period, redirecting a blast from the point by defenseman Mathieu Schneider to give the Kings a 1-0 lead.

The power-play goal was the Kings’ league-leading 51st--they rank second in the NHL in power-play conversion percentage--and Deadmarsh’s 18th, tied with Palffy for the team lead. The assist was Schneider’s third point in three games since returning to the lineup after sitting out two games because of a strained left shoulder.

Earlier, the Kings had killed three penalties thanks to some brilliant stops by Potvin, one a glove save on a shot from right in front of the net by Joe Nieuwendyk.

With the teams back at even strength, Potvin made another glove save, this one on a shot by Jamie Langenbrunner on a two-on-one breakaway.

Neither team generated many scoring opportunities during the scoreless second period, when the Kings were limited to only three shots on goal.

The Stars, who had eight shots in each of the first two periods, kept the pressure on early in the third but Potvin kept the puck out of the net.

About three minutes into the period, he made a pad save on a shot from just outside the crease by Pat Verbeek. About two minutes later, he used his stick to turn away a shot by Pierre Turgeon after the Star center had intercepted a clearing pass by defenseman Jaroslav Modry and skated in alone.

Not that Murray was surprised to be involved in a tight game.

“We have to realize that the way we’re going to have to play in the last 26 games is going to have to be on par with what we did last year,” he said, referring to his team’s stirring 13-5-5 stretch run into the playoffs last spring. “There’s no backing off.... We’ve got to play as hard as we possibly can.”