3/4 Preview – Corbesalo debuts + tonight’s vitals, what Byfield brings, Grundstrom’s return

Tonight’s match: The Kings are back home this evening after yesterday’s training day, as they host the St. Louis Blues for the first time this season.

face to face: Forward Kevin Fiala led the Kings with three assists when those teams met in St. Louis in October. Fiala has six points (2-4-6) in his last four matches against the Blues. Forward Karl Grundstrom scored twice in the Missouri meeting in November, while forward Gabe Velarde (1-1-2) had a multi-point night.

Kings Vitals: The Kings hit the ice for whole-team practice yesterday morning and opted for optional morning skiing here today in El Segundo.

Goaltender Jonas Korbesalo was first down this morning, with the prospect of making his regulation debut this evening with the Kings. Corbesalo faced the Blues six times throughout his NHL career, compiling a record of 3-3-0, with a 0.882 save percentage and a 3.99 goals-against average.

Between yesterday’s practice and this morning’s skate, here’s how the Kings can get along this evening –

Byfield – Kopitar – Kempe
Fiala – Danault – Arvidson
Yavalo – Lezotte – Villarde
Grundström-Kupari-Kaliyev
Anderson Dolan – Moore

Anderson – Dotty
Gavrikov – Roy
Idler – Dorzy
walker

Corbesalo
Copley

The Kings are expected to make one change on the backfield, Alex Edler signing on Sean Walker. Todd McClellan shared that Vladislav Gavrikov will be partnering with Matt Roy tonight, leaving Adler with Sean Dorsey in the other duo. Newly acquired forward Zack MacEwen has yet to arrive in Los Angeles by this morning. Forward Trevor Moore remains out of the lineup with an upper body injury, although he appears to be progressing and can be activated at any time, without a corresponding transaction.

BLUES VITALS: St. Louis snapped a six-game losing streak Thursday night in San Jose, with tonight’s second of three games on a Western swing.

Goaltender Jordan Pennington was on the starting lineup this morning for St. Louis, making him expected to start at goaltending against the Kings tonight. Bennington faced the Kings 12 times throughout his NHL career, with a record of 5-5-2, a . 909 save percentage and a 2.72 goals-for-hire average.

According to Jim Thomas of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, here’s how the Blues lined up last time –

Blues Stripes, Pairs:
Saad Shin Kero
Bukhnevich Thomas Kapanen
Bliss Brown Levu
Toropchenko-Alexandrov-Pitlick
Lady Parayko
Scandella Folk
Krug Portoso

– Jim Thomas (@jthom1) March 3, 2023

St. Louis made one deal yesterday, acquiring Jacob Vrana from the Detroit Red Wings. Blues defenseman Tore Krogh has eight points (2-6-8) over his last 12 games against the Kings. Former Kings pick Brayden Sheen is set to take first place tonight for the visitors.

Notes –
joonastarting
Tonight’s game against the St. Louis Personals marked Jonas Korepsalo’s debut with the Kings organization.

Corbesalo was acquired on Wednesday morning but, speaking with Todd McClellan, felt it was best to give him a Thursday to settle in, as well as a Friday training day with the group, while showing confidence in guard Phoenix Copley over what McClellan felt was strong. performance in flight. Copley got the start in Thursday’s win over Montreal and produced another solid performance. Now that Corbesalo has had two days to consolidate himself here in Los Angeles, it looks like full systems are going to make his first start for the Kings here this evening.

“I’m just trying to fight to stop every tweak, give it all out there,” Corbesalo said. “It’s the way it is with goalkeepers, our job is easy, just go and stop the ball. I just try to give 100 percent every night and go from there.”

When he spoke with Rob Blake, the Kings’ general manager, he used many of the same words to describe Korpisalo that McLellan would have to describe to Copley’s. The key word I took was calm, which relates to both his style of play and his mentality at the crease. His opening interview with the Kings captured the mental part of that, while we’ll get our first look at his stylistic approach here this evening.

Both McClellan and Blake indicated that there was no firm plan for a split between Corbesalo and Copley at this time. For now, the 1-1 distribution looks likely after tonight. There is no agenda to split 10-10 between the two, or anything preferable one way or the other. McClellan described both guards as important and indicated that they would both get playing opportunities. We’ll see how it changes going forward, but today is Corbesalo’s day and we’ll go from there.

“We felt in that situation, we had Copley who played very well on the road trip and got us a big win in Winnipeg, we wanted him to understand he’s valuable,” McClellan said this morning. “We didn’t go trade a goalkeeper to get rid of Pheonix, we traded a goalkeeper to help Pheonix and the couple will keep moving forward. So, it was a little bit of that and it was also travel and being comfortable with the surroundings, that kind of thing for Corbesalo. The environment that was around us allowed us to take that The decision, we knew we were going to play Corbesalo today.”

The Corbesalo and Copley tandem are clearly seen by the Kings as a divided situation at this time. Both will have the opportunity to play down the stretch and McClellan noted Thursday that both are very important down the stretch. The quote above seems to reinforce this point.

What brings Byfield
From a fan perspective, there seem to be two schools of thought surrounding Quinton Byfield and everyone seems to agree on the first part.

Either he “does a lot of things well and production will come” or “he does a lot of things well but he doesn’t produce”. Everyone is really saying the same thing, it’s just how it’s framed and how it’s worded. Byfield brings a lot to the first line at the moment and I don’t think it’s at all a coincidence that the attacking production from his buddies – Adrian Kempe and Anze Kopitar – has been through the roof since he was moved to that line. The numbers are starkly clear.

9/11 w/55 – 4.15 GF/60 vs. 1.62 GA/60
9/11 unchanged 55 – 2.33 GF/60 vs. 2.58 GA/60

While the expected versions of these numbers are indeed narrower, the chances of a high risk, with Byfield versus without, are very high and the chances against all are much lower. This is not to say that Byfield is leading the line, because Kopitar and Kempe, even before, still had solid productions. But it may be that Byfield enables Kopitar and Kempe to do certain things that lead to production.

“I think if you look at the physicality he’s brought to that line, compared to when he was playing quarterback maybe in the third line, he’s really strengthened the other two and maybe feels good about himself and he should,” McClellan said. The individual stats, collectively they’ve done a really good job and he’s played a big part in that so far.”

The bench chief went on to add that the Kings still envision Byfield as a center for the long haul, still as a guy who can carry his own streak rather than being a complement to others. He will still need to develop and develop into this player but he is still only 20 years old and recording first line minutes in a very productive streak.

If you look at a play like the 2-on-1 chance he had with Kopitar against Montreal, eventually the puck should go in and it will. McClellan said so much. Look at his assists late in the game, though, to show off his playmaking ability. It is first physical strength that separates man from the puck, vision and passing ability to find Kopitar up front for the goal.

“I think he’s always been there, I have to do it more often and be more effective with him,” Byfield said of his check. “I didn’t do that much in the juniors, I didn’t always have to, but it’s another level here. To have this breakup, I’m just trying to find the guys and I want to keep doing that.”

Over time, odd numbers will rise. For now, a video like the one above shows that it’s actually coming. More to track.

Carl back
Karl Grundstrom is now back in action for two games due to an injury that cost him about six weeks of game time. So far, so good in his coach’s words.

“[We’ve got] McClellan said of Grundstrom’s play. “The physicality, the straights, the finishing checks, creating chances out of check, blocking shots, shooting him when he gets the chance. Straightforward with Karl Grundström and that’s when he gives his best.”

Hear from Grundstrom below, who talks about how he felt over two games, how much he likes his hockey style this time of year and his recovery as things progress.

Kings and Blues, tonight at 7:30 PM from Crypto.com Arena. see you there!