Kings have fun at Predators’ expense

The Kings are going nowhere this season. That doesn’t mean they can’t have some fun along the way.

The Kings, with the worst record in the Western Conference, beat the Nashville Predators, the best team in the West, 4-1 on Saturday night. The Kings, who own the NHL’s worst road record (8-18-2), are 2-0-3 in their last five games.

Anze Kopitar scored twice and Brian Willsie and Michael Cammalleri had goals for the Kings. Sean Burke made 21 saves.

“It was a classic total team effort for us,” Kings Coach Marc Crawford said. “We knew we had to keep our composure. That’s always the way you have to play against teams that have as much talent as the Predators have.”

Dan Hamhuis scored for Nashville, whose franchise-record eight-game home winning streak ended.

“It’s no secret that Los Angeles has been playing well,” Coach Barry Trotz said. “Sean Burke is playing really strong lately for them. They have a real solid defense that has been a staple all year. They just hadn’t been in sync as a team, but lately they have been.”

Kopitar gave the Kings a 1-0 lead 29 seconds into the middle period. His shot from low inside the right circle bounced off the glove of goalie Tomas Vokoun and came to Lubomir Visnovsky, who fired the rebound back from the left side. That shot caromed off Vokoun to Kopitar, who put the puck in off Vokoun, who fell backward in the crease.

Kopitar said the Kings were motivated by their last visit to Nashville, a 7-0 loss on Dec. 23.

“We knew we had to come out strong and we did,” he said. “Our last game here we got beat pretty bad. We paid attention to details. We executed and that brought the success in this game.”