Each Second Counts in King Loss

Minutes away from victory, the Kings got tied up.

Seconds away from at least one point, they got lost.

The Kings got confused in their defensive coverage a precious few seconds too early and Steve Yzerman converted a 2-on-3 situation with 1.7 seconds remaining to give the Detroit Red Wings a 3-2 victory in a season opener Thursday before a sold-out crowd of 20,066 at Joe Louis Arena.

Undermanned at almost every position because of injuries, the Kings managed to turn a well-earned regulation tie on the road into a poor loss. Even worse, the Kings led, 2-1, until Detroit center Pavel Datsyuk scored with 3:45 left.

Almost 3:45 later, Yzerman beat goaltender Roman Cechmanek after a blind backhand pass from Ray Whitney near the right face-off circle.

“We missed a coverage assignment on the last goal,” King Coach Andy Murray said. “With 15 seconds to go in the game, the puck was in their zone. Then they score with 1.7 seconds left. Very disappointing.”

The Kings had possession in the Red Wing zone after Sean Avery’s close-range shot at Detroit goaltender Dominik Hasek.

But the Red Wings sent the puck quickly up ice. Whitney found Yzerman. The Kings couldn’t find any answers.

“I kind of went on Yzerman and got a piece of the puck,” center Eric Belanger said. “I thought our defensemen [Lubomir Visnovsky and Jaroslav Modry] were going to get it because it was close to them. Then everybody kind of backed up. I thought it was a no-situation that ended up in the net. Tough break.”

The Kings took a 2-1 lead on Ziggy Palffy’s goal with 10:06 left and put themselves in position to win despite missing three prominent players -- forwards Jason Allison and Adam Deadmarsh and defenseman Aaron Miller.

Deadmarsh, once dubbed a “Red Wings killer” by Yzerman, has not played since December because of two concussions he sustained in a two-week span. Allison has been out since sustaining three whiplash collisions in February, and Miller could be out another three weeks with a fractured wrist.

“Injuries are the least of my concern,” Murray said. “We were leading the hockey game with just under four minutes left and ended up losing and giving up the winning goal in the last second. That’s the thing that disturbs me most right now.”

Making matters worse for the Kings, defenseman Mattias Norstrom left the game less than five minutes into the first period after feeling numbness in his right arm. Norstrom, pinched into the left boards while trying to move the puck up ice, will fly back to Los Angeles today and miss the remaining two games on the road trip.

“My strength in my right arm went out,” Norstrom said. “Hopefully it’s not serious. We need to get everybody back, including myself.”

Detroit opened the scoring on a crisp backdoor play from Pavel Datsyuk to Jiri Fischer at 10:10 of the first period.

The Kings tied the score on a solid effort by Belanger with 7:49 left in the second period. Belanger’s shot as he streamed down the left side caught Hasek by surprise, knocking him off balance long enough for Belanger to continue around the net and poke in a quick pass from Avery.

It was the only highlight for Avery, who had three penalties in his first game back in Detroit after being traded to the Kings in March in the Mathieu Schneider deal.

“Avery’s juiced most of the time,” Murray said. “He has to control that juice.”

The Red Wings were the ones pumped up at the end.

After a listless 2-6-1 preseason, they outshot the Kings, 38-23, including a decisive 19-3 edge in the third period, and created a memorable victory in Hasek’s first game back from a one-year retirement.

Said Yzerman: “I just didn’t want there to be booing at the end.”

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For Starters

A look at Kings’ and Red Wings’ records on opening night:

*--* Games Record DETROIT 78 33-31-14 KINGS 37 16-12-9

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