Devils’ Brodeur Puts Up Heavy Resistance

If only the NHL All-Star break had been two weeks earlier.

That’s how the Kings must feel today after losing to the New Jersey Devils, 4-1, Tuesday night and ending a five-game unbeaten streak before 11,511 at the Forum.

In spotting New Jersey a 3-0 first-period lead, the Kings had a flashback to how they played in going 4-16-1 over a six-week period before their 4-0-1 streak going into the All-Star game last Sunday.

“You hate to use the [All-Star break] as an excuse, because we just weren’t very good in the first period and that cost us the game,” King center Ray Ferraro said. “Whether the break came at the right time or the wrong time, we just played a bad first period and you can’t fall down by three goals against New Jersey. You’re never going to catch them.”

Whatever chemistry the Kings had in victories over Buffalo, St. Louis and Toronto and a tie at Detroit before having six days off, they clearly were without it against the Devils.

New Jersey’s stingy defensive style and goaltender Martin Brodeur, who stopped 33 of 34 shots, was too much for the Kings, who had averaged four goals per game in their five-game unbeaten streak before the break.

The Kings did not help themselves by going zero for four on power plays, extending their scoreless streak to 12.

“Our power play was just horrible,” said King Coach Larry Robinson, who dropped to 0-3 against the team for which he served as an assistant coach during its Stanley Cup season in 1994-95. “We thought we would just go with our regular lines to see if that might help.”

But it didn’t, as the Kings had several good scoring chances but were either an inch off or a second too late against Brodeur, who was helped by two goals from Dave Andreychuk and one each by Bobby Holik and Bill Guerin.

King left wing Kevin Stevens, who had scored in four of his last five games, set the tone for the game when he had a breakaway shot stopped by Brodeur five minutes into the first period.

Following Stevens’ miss, the Devils quickly scored in transition against King goalie Stephane Fiset, who stopped 31 shots and dropped to 7-17-4.

Andreychuk scored the goal from the slot at 6:09 when he took in a pass from Holik, who had skated uncontested into the right circle. It was Andreychuk’s 15th goal of the season.

The Devils, who held the Kings to only six first-period shots, took a 2-0 lead when Andreychuk scored a power-play goal when he deflected in a slap shot by Holik, who finished with two assists, at 14:44.

New Jersey then took a three-goal lead when Holik whacked in a pass from Steve Sullivan with 36 seconds remaining in the first period.

In the second period, the Kings played better but were not able to score despite outshooting New Jersey, 13-11.

“That was the best first period that we’ve played all year,” New Jersey Coach Jacques Lemaire said. “It was the best we can play and then they came out strong in the second period. We made a couple of bad passes but Martin [Brodeur] played super.”

The Devils took a 4-0 lead at 10:27 of the third period when Guerin scored on an assist from Valeri Zelepukin.

The Kings finally scored at 13:52 when Ian Laperriere scored to prevent the team’s eighth shutout of the season.

“When you come off a layoff you have to be ready to compete right off the start,” Robinson said. “We did for the first 10 minutes, but after their first goal we just fell apart. . . . We had guys going all over the place.”

The Kings will now play at San Jose in their ninth back-to-back set of the season. They are 4-11-2 in games played on consecutive nights.

“If we want to make excuses we always can find them, but the break was the same for both teams,” said Robinson, whose team dropped to 10-10-2 at home. “The second period we played better and the third we started to compete with them and started to skate, but when you’re down, 3-0, it’s too little too late.

“We just didn’t compete in the corners and didn’t play strong in front of the net.”