"If they had been playing chess, you would say the Ducks sacrificed their queen, a strategy that was tough to rationalize in the moment. Fortunately they were playing hockey, and the sight of Corey Perry fighting the Kings' Wayne Simmonds with his team trailing by three goals in the third period contained more action than a chess match. But the result was the same: The Ducks' leading scorer was sent off the ice, the game all but over with more than 11 minutes left on the clock. Simmonds had skated between teammate Michal Handzus and the Ducks' Matt Beleskey. "Perry came by and slashed me and asked me to go," he said. "That was it. I was happy to oblige. He's one of their better players. Any time you can get him off the ice for five minutes, it's good." It was one of many lessons the Kings imparted in their 4-1 win over the Ducks before an announced sellout crowd of 18,313 at Staples Center. The lesson had little to do with the first period - a familiar problem for the Ducks and one that seemed inevitable after their four-day layoff without a game or practice. Instead, the Kings waited until the second period to outwork the Ducks, getting goals from Simmonds, Anze Kopitar, Justin Williams and Dustin Brown to completely deflate their rivals. Kings goalie Jonathan Bernier, getting his second start in December, needed only 18 saves for a relatively easy win. Ducks goalie Jonas Hiller didn't even make it out of the fateful second period, heading for the bench after Brown's power-play goal at 17:57 provided the final score. Except for the goal by Williams, who picked the puck from Joffrey Lupul in the Ducks' zone and smoked a wrist shot past Hiller, all of the Kings goals were the result of rebounds that angled perfectly to purple sticks. The Kings' ability to anticipate rebounds wasn't an accident. "A lot of it is being talked about in the group in our pregame meetings and between periods," Kings coach Terry Murray said. Beleskey, who returned from the American Hockey League to play his first NHL game since Dec. 7, scored the only goal for the Ducks (18-17-4). After Simmonds scored a backdoor goal 15 seconds into the second period, Beleskey re-directed Toni Lydman's shot 32 seconds later to tie the score at 1. Kopitar re-directed Marco Sturm's shot at 9:10 to put the Kings ahead 2-1 and give Sturm his first point of the season. Sturm played 10:03, all at even strength, in his third game since joining the Kings (21-12-1). " Read more: http://www.dailynews.com/sports/ci_16949094
