Kings extend Blues’ woes in 5-1 loss

In St Louis, the Blues have been listless over their last five games. As a result they are now on a five-game skid, and are not looking good at this point. After winning three first three games of the season, the Blues offense and defense have deserted them. And their goaltending is nothing to write home about.

On Monday night, the Los Angeles Kings came to town and hung a 5-1 loss on the Blues.

Carl Grundstrom hit for a double for LA.

“It has been that way for a couple of nights,” Los Angeles coach Todd McLellan said. “We’ll see what happens in Dallas (on Tuesday). We knew we’d have our hands full. Obviously, they’re not very happy with their game, just as we were a few games ago (in a 6-4 loss to the Winnipeg Jets on Thursday). I like the way we started, and we stuck with it. I think we checked our way to some goals, which was really important. Then down the stretch, the penalty kill came up right big. I thought ‘Quicky’ had a real good night. Overall, a real good night.”

Jonathan Quick made 27 saves for the Kings.

LA improved to 6-5-0.

St Louis dropped to 3-5-0 and have been outscored 25-8 in their stinker of a skid.

“I can say it and [the fans] can see it, it’s kind of a [pathetic] effort from us the last couple games,” St. Louis defenseman Justin Faulk said. “We have leads, we’re down one today going into the second period and just kind of lay an egg. There’s no reason for it. The other team’s trying to win, and if you can give them an inch, they can tell, and obviously Montreal saw it the other night (in a 7-4 loss on Saturday). They saw we sat back and didn’t want to play a hard game, and they took it over. L.A. did the same thing here.”

LA took a 1-0 lead in the first period off a strike from Gabriel Vilardi.

The Kings did most of their work in the middle frame when they scored four goals.

Grundstrom scored his two in the outburst, his first extended the lead to 2-0.

Anze Kopitar made it 3-0 for LA.

“Well, you’ve got to take what you’re given,” McLellan said. “I think early in the year we were forcing some stuff and still getting rewarded. Tonight, we took what was there. You have to read quick and take what’s there. Our team did a better job tonight on that than we have.”

Arthur Kaliyev pushed the lead to 4-0.

Grundstrom made it 5-0 with his second goal of the game.

“Had a couple of chances there, and it was nice to get two goals tonight,” Grundstrom said. “I just try to stay open. It’s always fun to score.”

All four goals were hit before the midway point of the second period.

“I don’t need to give you a long-winded answer,” St Louis’ Brayden Schenn said. “It comes down to three or four things. Our compete level, our willingness to work, forecheck and winning battles, and playing D-zone. It’s kind of what it comes down to. It’s not rocket science by any means. It’s three or four things that we have to correct and correct them fast.

“You’ve got to realize how tough it is to win in this league, and I don’t think we realize that right now.”