Ducks Look to Sweep Two-Game Set vs. LA Tonight

No matter what happens in tonight's rematch between the Ducks and Kings at Honda Center, if it's a tight game to the final horn, it won't surprise anyone.

Monday night's 6-5 overtime victory for Anaheim marked the eighth straight one-goal game for the Ducks, matching a franchise record set February 28 through March 19, 2009. Of the 26 games the Ducks have played so far, nineteen have been decided by a single goal (73.1%), the highest percentage in the NHL.
In recent history, nail-biters between the Ducks and Kings have been frequent too, as 21 of the last 33 battles between the longtime rivals have been decided by just one goal.
"I always just kind of shake my head because every team in this league is dangerous in its own right," Ducks coach Dallas Eakins said. "Even though the standings separate themselves out, there are so many one-goal games. The league is tight. It doesn't matter who you're playing, you know you're gonna be in for one. That's kind of how we look at it."
The Ducks are on pace to play the most one-goal games in the league in more than 10 years, with only two clubs in the last 10 years with more than 60% of their games decided by one goal (Columbus in 2019-20 at 61.4% and New Jersey in 2013-14 at 61.0%). Only St. Louis has a streak of eight straight one-goal games this season (Feb. 13-present).
"I don't feel a real stress level with our team [in those games], maybe because we've been in so many now," Eakins said. "It's not that big a deal to the group. Hopefully we can find ourselves on the right side of these one-goal games. That's part of a team in transition and part of the development process of learning how to win those very tight games. I think we're starting to do that."
Monday night's opener of this two-game set at times looked like it might be an Anaheim runaway, until the Kings wiped out a couple of two-goal leads, including the third goal of the game from Adrian Kempe with just 2 1/2 minutes left in regulation.
But the Ducks recovered in overtime, getting a pretty Adam Henrique goal off a feed from rookie Trevor Zegras 3:00 into the extra session.

"Such a great unselfish play by [Zegras]," Ducks coach Dallas Eakins said. "There's a young man looking for his first (NHL) goal and instead of wiring it, he makes the play backdoor to win the game."
Rickard Rakell was another hero for the Ducks, punching in two goals and adding an assist for his second straight three-point game. Rakell has 12 points (five goals and seven assists) in a six-game points streak.
"He's just slowly been chipping away at it," Eakins said. "Ricky was very, very upset. He takes it personally. He's got really high standards for himself and, for whatever reason, that puck wasn't going in the net for him early."
With Monday night's victory, Anaheim improved to 22-7-5 in the last 33 regular season games vs. LA. After a frustrating nine-game stretch in which they went 0-6-3, the Ducks are looking for their first three-game win streak of the season tonight.
Whether they will have defenseman Josh Manson and winger Troy Terry in that quest remains to be seen. Manson (lower body) and Terry (upper body) both left Monday's game with injuries and Eakins said yesterday, "They are both being assessed, and they're day to day until they tell me different."