Copley, Kings shut out Canadiens for 5th straight win

LOS ANGELES -- Pheonix Copley made 18 saves when the Los Angeles Kings won their fifth straight game, 4-0 against the Montreal Canadiens at Crypto.com Arena on Saturday.

It was the third shutout for Copley in 67 NHL starts and first since Feb. 11 of last season.

Trevor Moore scored twice, and Pierre-Luc Dubois had two assists for Los Angeles (13-3-3), which has allowed five goals during the winning streak.

"Right now we're playing a good team game, so we'll just keep it rolling," Copley said.

Jake Allen made 26 saves for Montreal (9-10-2), which had won two straight, but is 2-5-0 in its past seven games.

"I felt we competed. I felt like we worked," Canadiens coach Martin St. Louis said. "If anything, it's that offensive pace they play with, in terms of getting pucks back. In our [defensive] zone, when they lose the puck, they're hunting to get it back and there's not much room."

Los Angeles outshot Montreal 10-1 in the first period, with the Canadiens' only shot on goal coming on a 148-foot clear while short-handed.

"I think our neutral zone has been phenomenal," Kings defenseman Andreas Englund said. "That makes it easier for us to break out because they have to dump the puck."

Carl Grundstrom gave the Kings a 1-0 lead at 15:28 of the first period. Dubois brought the puck through the neutral zone and centered a pass to Alex Laferriere as each crossed the blue line. Laferriere didn't get his stick on the puck, and it continued to Grundstrom, who scored with a one-timer from the top of the right circle.

"He's really strong on the puck," Grundstrom said of Dubois. "So just try to skate and be open for him to find lanes."

Copley made his most difficult save on a Montreal power play at 3:43 of the second. A pass through the crease came to Nick Suzuki, but Copley slid over and knocked the puck aside with his right skate to maintain the one-goal lead.

Copley said he has been putting in extra work with goalie coach Mike Buckley before and after practice to correct an inconsistent start to the season. Prior to Saturday, he was 2-0-2 with a 3.75 goals-against average and .845 save percentage backing up Cam Talbot (10-3-1, 2.02 GAA, .931 save percentage).

"It's been helping me out a lot," Copley said. "The guys are playing great in front of me, so that helps a lot. The extra work has been just sharpening things up."

Moore scored on a wraparound to extend the lead to 2-0 at 9:55 of the second.

The Kings made it 3-0 at 3:14 of the third when Jaret Anderson-Dolan stole a pass in the Canadiens zone and fed Trevor Lewis, who scored with a wrist shot from the bottom of the right circle.

"They give you no room to breathe," Allen said of Los Angeles. "When you have time and space against those guys, it's totally different than you would against another team. They play probably the best team game I've seen in the League ... It's really impressive to watch."

St. Louis said the Kings benefit from having all the players on the ice working and skating hard, whether they have the puck or not.

"That's what we're chasing, that's what we want to look like," St. Louis said. "When we do that, we're hard to play against. We've just got to find more consistency and play with that pace when we lose pucks."

Moore made it 4-0 at 13:26, scoring his team-leading 11th goal of the season with a backhand from just above the goal line that slipped through on the short side. Moore has six points (four goals, two assists) in his past three games.

"We stuck with our game," Moore said. "A couple turnovers there in the second, but other than that, it was shift after shift doing what we wanted to do, staying patient and we got the win."

NOTES: The Kings had never shut out the Canadiens in Los Angeles in 76 previous games. ... The Kings are 11-0-1 when scoring first this season. ... Dubois has eight points (two goals, six assists) in his past five games against Montreal.