No Extra Credit for Kings

The attack of the clones, though entertaining and eventful, was not won by the Kings.

In a game between teams whose season-long storylines are nearly impossible to distinguish, the distinction between winner and loser also became blurred.

It looked as if the Kings would win, then the Atlanta Thrashers were a sure thing, then the Kings struck back. In the end, Atlanta took a 4-3 overtime victory before an exhausted crowd of 11,059 Wednesday at Philips Arena.

The Kings squandered a 2-1 lead, allowing two goals in the final four minutes, but Joe Corvo’s slap shot with 4.8 seconds forced overtime and guaranteed the Kings at least one point.

That was all they got.

Marc Savard scored on a rebound of Ilya Kovalchuk’s shot with 1:23 left in overtime and the Kings lost in the extra session for a second consecutive time.

Their late collapse cost them victory against a strikingly similar team that, like the Kings, has been hit hard by injuries but has managed to stay in first place in its division.

A point earned for the Kings, a point lost for the Kings.

“It feels like we lost,” defenseman Mattias Norstrom said. “We’ve got to tighten it up in the end. Tonight we played a good 56 minutes.”

Luc Robitaille and Eric Belanger scored in a 56-second span of the first period and the Kings were in control almost the rest of the way, with the initial exception of Savard’s first goal that sliced the King lead in half at 7:33 of the first period.

The Kings outshot an opponent for an 11th consecutive game -- 32-21 on Wednesday -- but problems started to appear in the final few minutes.

One clone started to malfunction, and the other capitalized.

Vyacheslav Kozlov scored with 4:00 left, intercepting Corvo’s pass near the King blue line, skating untouched to the left circle and beating goaltender Cristobal Huet with a slap shot.

The Thrashers took a 3-2 lead with 1:14 left when Shawn McEachern beat Corvo in a race to a puck inside the King blue line. McEachern ripped a shot that beat Huet to the stick side.

The Kings answered on Corvo’s slap shot from the left point, but the Thrashers did the only scoring in overtime.

Kovalchuk began the ending with a shot that deflected off Huet’s left skate and trickled out to the right side of the crease. Savard was there to finish.

“Everyone knows what type of year we have had,” Savard said. “We have worked through everything and that’s a credit to the people we have in here. A very big win for us tonight.”

King Coach Andy Murray lobbied for a penalty on the play and claimed the Thrashers had too many men on the ice.

“I’m not complaining or saying anyone cheated, but when their guy comes right off the bench and gets the puck as the guy he’s supposed to be replacing is just getting off the ice ... that’s how they got the goal,” Murray said. “If they can get away with it, it’s a great move, but it should have been blown down and they should have been given a penalty.”

The Kings gave in to frustration. Two games into their road trip, two overtime losses.

“They are a good team here in Atlanta, and to come here and play as well as we played for most of the game and not get two points is not a good thing,” Murray said.