Meter On for King Coach

John Torchetti, a former cab driver who worked late-night shifts and once had a knife pulled on him, was scared as he flew to Los Angeles on Wednesday for his first news conference as the Kings’ interim coach.

The trip from Boston -- part of a journey that began as a player in North Carolina 20 years ago -- had Torchetti on edge by the time he landed smack in the middle of the Stanley Cup playoff race.

“I was petrified coming here today,” he said. “I had so much going in my mind last night, ‘What’s the first thing I was going to present? ... What am I going to say to these 24 players?’ ”

Yet, fear was his friend.

“You know, if your guts are not feeling it any more, get out,” Torchetti said.

And that may be the best message he brings to the Kings.

General Manager Dave Taylor, desperate to stem the team’s accelerating slide out of the playoff picture, fired coach Andy Murray and reached across the continent to a relatively unknown coach to salvage what is left in the season.

The choice raised eyebrows.

Torchetti was out of hockey, at least officially, and his NHL experience was limited to a season as an assistant with the Florida Panthers -- including 27 games as their interim coach -- and two seasons as an assistant with the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Now he is handed a team that has lost five of its last seven games and certainly appeared weary of Murray’s coaching style, judging by their listless play the last two weeks. Torchetti has 12 games to turn it around.

So, in terms of his former profession, the meter is running.

“When I drove, I loved it,” said Torchetti, who was a cabby while coaching as an unpaid intern for the Greensboro Monarchs in 1993 to ’95. “I had a goal every week of how much money I was supposed to make and I wouldn’t get out of that cab until I made that money.

“That was a tough job. There were nights I didn’t get my quota. So I would go back out after the games and drive people until 2 to 3 a.m., into some pretty tough neighborhoods. That was the job.”

That too is a static-free message for a team that has been in near free-fall since early January, dropping this week to ninth place in the Western Conference.

“I was concerned that if we didn’t make the change at this point, we weren’t going to get it turned around,” Taylor said.

Instead of promoting from within, Taylor went after “a fresh voice” before Tim Leiweke, the Kings’ chief executive, went after a different general manager.

Torchetti had hoped to get a call from Taylor -- eight months ago. He had been a candidate to coach at Manchester, the Kings’ American Hockey League team.

“I was surprised to get a call from anyone because of how little time there is left in the season,” Torchetti said. “I called a few of my coaching friends and asked them if they had a 12-game plan. They all said, ‘Go be yourself.’ ”

He will start by meeting with players as they head into the next game -- Saturday against Nashville at Staples Center.

The to-do list seems lengthy. The Kings’ power play ranks 26th in the NHL. Goaltender Mathieu Garon has been inconsistent. And now the team’s desire is in doubt. In their last three losses, the Kings were deep in the hole by the time their opponent broke a good sweat. They gave up three goals in the first five shots against Phoenix, two in the first five shots against Dallas and two in the first three shots against Colorado.

“We’ll make some adjustments on the special teams,” Torchetti said. “You’ve got to get more shots and you have to get guys in front of the net. You have to create chaos. I’ll review film and work with the assistant coaches. But I also need to talk with the players. They are the ones out there.”

Torchetti learned to solicit opinions while playing for Rick Dudley on the Carolina Thunderbirds of the Atlantic Coast Hockey League. Dudley went on to become general manager with Tampa Bay and Florida.

Back then, though, Dudley was general manager, coach and bus driver for the Thunderbirds. On road trips, while other players slept, Torchetti would sit on the bus air cooler and absorb everything Dudley told him.

“He was why I fell in love with coaching because he would have done anything for you,” Torchetti said. “He treated you like gold. He never yelled at you as a player.”

He followed Dudley, starting as a scout with Tampa Bay, then an assistant coach. When Dudley went to the Panthers, Torchetti did too and became the team’s interim coach, with a 10-12-4 record at the end of the 2003-04 season.

While Torchetti was out of hockey, he was hardly out of hockey rinks. He made it to many Boston Bruin games, and hit the minor league circuit as well.

He also spent hours in front of his television set, watching games. How many hours?

“Let’s put it this way, the Chips Ahoy and Wise Potato Chips people are pretty happy with me,” Torchetti said. “I wanted to see certain traits, how teams were doing breakouts, what they were doing on power plays.”

Yet, whether playing hockey or driving a cab, one thing is certain, Torchetti said: “Nine times out of 10, the team that works the hardest goes home happy.”