Oilers’ tip-in beats Kings in overtime

This may well end up the Kings’ epitaph: just not good enough.

That is how their 2-1 overtime loss to the Edmonton Oilers played out Monday night in front of an announced 16,224 at Staples Center. That is how they have meandered through a season that seems headed toward a lottery draft pick.

Goaltender Mathieu Garon was brilliant in net. Kings forward Konstantin Pushkarev made a splash with his first NHL goal, tying the score in the third period. The Kings started strong and lived up to their “Play Hard” marketing slogan.

It was just not good enough.

“There are teams that have the luxury of not being at their best and they still can win,” Coach Marc Crawford said Monday morning. “We have to be at our absolute best to win.”

The Kings were horseshoes-and-hand-grenades-close to that Monday. Then Alexander Frolov lost sight of Jan Hejda in overtime.

Hejda slipped in the back door, where he redirected a Ryan Smyth pass into the goal 1 minute 14 seconds into overtime. That denied the Kings the chance for their first three-game winning streak this season, leaving them with a one-point consolation prize.

The King may go on to fight their way into the playoff race. The problem is they are still working off a debt incurred in October, when they lost 10 of 14 games.

“It’s frustrating not to get that third win” in a row, Garon said. “I thought when we tied the game, we were going to win this won.”

Garon did his part.

While Dan Cloutier sits on injured reserve, Garon has looked like a goaltender worthy of a contract extension. Garon, an unrestricted free agent after this season, made 27 saves Monday.

But Edmonton’s Jarret Stoll, rocketing a one-timer before Garon could react, broke a scoreless tie 7:17 into the second period.

“Matty played really well tonight, but we got to score more than one goal for him,” forward Michael Cammalleri said.

Pushkarev, recalled from minor league Manchester on Thursday, provided the one. He was dropped into the Kings’ top line with Anze Kopitar and Dustin Brown -- a line that averages 21 years of age -- and produced.

Pushkarev checked Edmonton’s Mathieu Roy in the corner, forcing a turnover.

Pushkarev then got to the net in time to redirect a Lubomir Visnovsky shot for his first NHL goal to tie the score 5:49 into the third period.

“You look at Push and he doesn’t seem like much,” Crawford said. “He’s like the little guy I worked with when I was a garbage man in Belleville. He didn’t look like much either, but by the end of the day I was dragging my [rear] and he was still going strong.”

The Kings, on the other hand, were dragging.

“We got away with one point and I feel that is not good enough,” defenseman Mattias Norstrom said.

chris.foster@latimes.com