Rookie stops the Kings

The Kings scored the first goals of the season against Dallas goalie Mike Smith, but the rookie made 32 saves in his second career start to lead the Stars to a 3-2 victory on Saturday night.

“I wasn’t expecting to shut everybody out and go 25-0 this season,” said Smith, who had a shutout in his NHL debut against the Phoenix Coyotes on Oct. 21. “It was exciting out there. I feel like I had a good mental focus out there.”

Jeff Halpern scored the winning goal with 3:44 left. It was his first goal of the season.

The Stars, who lost Friday night to Detroit, extended the Kings’ winless streak to five games (0-4-1). It is the longest slide for the Kings since they lost the last 11 games of the 2003-2004 season. They continue to struggle offensively, scoring just 14 goals over the last 10 games.

“We keep getting good effort,” Jeff Cowan said. “This is tough. But if we keep playing hard this will eventually turn around.”

Philippe Boucher and Stu Barnes scored for Dallas (9-2-0), matching the franchise mark that was set in 1996-97.

The Kings tied the score at 2-2 on Tom Kostopoulos’ goal at 7:10 of the third period.

They pulled Mathieu Garon in the final minute and had a two-man advantage for the last 28.7 seconds when Sergei Zubov was called for hooking. But the Kings couldn’t get a shot off.

“We gave up that goal at the end of the game,” said Garon, who had 25 saves. “It always seems like we have bad luck toward the end of games.”

The Kings’ 3-8-2 record is their worst start to a season since 1987-88, when they went 3-9-1. They have lost five consecutive games and 12 of their last 11. To make matters worse, they have lost four of five games to Pacific Division teams and have yet to beat a team that has a better than .500 record.

Rob Blake’s goal ended an 0-for-24 streak on the power play. It failed to energize the offense, as the Kings failed to score more than one goal for the fourth consecutive game.

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Times staff writer Chris Foster contributed to this report.