Dubois scores twice in 12 seconds, Kings defeat Wild

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Pierre-Luc Dubois scored two goals in a 12-second span in the first period, and the Los Angeles Kings defeated the Minnesota Wild 7-3 at Xcel Energy Center on Thursday.

Dubois gave the Kings a 3-2 lead at 19:02 of the first period after deflecting in a shot from Kevin Fiala. The goal stood after video review, which showed Dubois deflected the puck with his stick after it made contact with his skate.

Dubois scored again from the slot at 19:14 to make it 4-2 after Fiala forced a turnover on a clearing attempt from Wild goalie Marc-Andre Fleury.

“Quite frankly, it was a strange period, the way some of the goals went in and the type of challenges both ways,” Los Angeles coach Todd McLellan said of the first. “But, to come out of a strange period like that up two goals on the road, we’ll take it. Some of the goals weren’t pretty, but they all count at the end of the night. Then, I think, as the game went on, still made mistakes, but (goalie Cam Talbot) was really good and started to lock it down.”

Anze Kopitar had an assist in his franchise-tying 1,296th game (Dustin Brown), and Trevor Moore scored in his third straight game for the Kings (2-1-1). Talbot made 29 saves.

Connor Dewar and Kirill Kaprizov scored, and Fleury made 20 saves for the Wild (2-2-0).

“A couple tough bounces, I thought,” Fleury said. “Bad scramble in front and then puck just came out of nowhere and then the guy kicked it. I was going to pass to them, and they just kept coming. I think on the last one in the third too I probably did a bad play. I try to rim it, but their guy picked it up and the scramble in front again. Other than that, I thought we stuck with it, I thought we were right there and definitely a tough loss.”

Carl Grundstrom put Los Angeles ahead 1-0 at 2:39 of the first period with a snap shot from the right circle.

Dewar tied it 1-1 at 6:21 on a rebound off a puck that careened off the stanchion to him in front.

Kaprizov gave Minnesota a 2-1 lead at 8:00, deflecting in a one-timer from Jonas Brodin at the point.

The Kings challenged for offside on Kaprizov's goal, but it stood following video review.

Vladislav Gavrikov tied it 2-2 at 15:46, scoring on a rebound with a backhander in the slot.

“That was a fortunate bounce, just try to grab a shot and we found a rebound,” Gavrikov said.

Moore extended the lead to 5-2 at 10:13 of the third period following Dubois’ goals.

Joel Eriksson Ek cut it to 5-3 at 14:38, completing the 2-on-1 with Marcus Johansson, but Adrian Kempe pushed it to 6-3 at 17:41 after scoring his first goal of the season into an empty net.

“That’s hockey,” Dewar said. “We shouldn’t have to score five or six goals to win a game. We had our chances.”

Blake Lizotte also scored his first goal of the season with a short-handed, empty-net goal at 18:52 for the 7-3 final.

“It was a little bit of a weird game I thought,” Fiala said. “Not much on both ends but we capitalized on our chances and won the game. That’s what is great.”

Los Angeles went 4-for-4 on the penalty kill.

“Our power play has to be better in a game like that, right?” Minnesota coach Dean Evason said. “We needed them to score, obviously, tonight and we didn’t have a penalty kill. Our special teams could have made the difference here, and tonight they did not.”

NOTES: Only two Kings players have scored twice faster than Dubois: Ralph Backstrom (six seconds apart on Nov. 2, 1972 against the Boston Bruins), and Jari Kurri (10 seconds apart on Oct. 4, 1991 at the Winnipeg Jets). Wild defenseman Brock Faber was minus-1 in 20:06 of ice time in his first career game against Los Angeles after being acquired along with a first-round pick in the 2022 NHL Draft from the Kings in a trade with the Wild for Fiala on July 4, 2022.