Kings lose Darcy Kuemper and scoring slump continues against Stars

DALLAS — Things rarely seem to go well for the Kings in Texas. At least, not lately.

Mikko Rantanen, Matt Duchene and Wyatt Johnston had a goal and an assist each and Casey DeSmith tied a Dallas record with his 11th consecutive game earning points as the Stars rallied past the Kings, 4-1, on Monday night.

The Stars have earned at least a point in eight consecutive home games against the Kings (7-0-1), outscoring the visitors 33-15 over that span.

Oskar Back scored his first NHL winning goal for the Stars (22-7-5), who are second in the overall standings and avoided their first three-game losing streak since mid-October. DeSmith made 27 saves and is 8-0-3 after losing his first start of the season, matching Ed Belfour’s 8-0-3 run during the 1998-99 season.

Andrei Kuzmenko scored an unassisted 5-on-3 goal for the Kings (14-9-9), who have lost their last three games (0-1-2) while scoring just four goals.

Darcy Kuemper stopped all five shots he faced before Rantanen collided with him at 16:00 of the first period, forcing the goalie out of the game with an upper-body injury. Kuemper took a forearm to the head and was down on the ice for several minutes before eventually going back to the locker room under his own power.

“I saw a player come into the blue paint and run into our goaltender, that’s what I saw,” Kings coach Jim Hiller told NHL.com, adding that he had no further update on Kuemper’s status.

Johnston put the puck on net from a sharp angle and it went in off Kuemper after the contact with Rantanen, although the goal was waived off for goaltender interference.

Anton Forsberg took over in net and saved 17 of 20 shots.

Kuzmenko gave the Kings a 1-0 lead at 11:03 of the second period. Dallas won a faceoff in its own zone and the puck came back to DeSmith. As he looked up the ice, preparing to pass, Kuzmenko skated over and swept the puck into the net.

Four of Kuzmenko’s five goals this season are power-play goals on a team whose power play ranks last in the NHL at 14.7%.

Forsberg made an excellent pad save to rob Mavrik Bourque at the left post at 14:35 of the middle frame.

Duchene tied the score at 1-1 at 15:42 of the second. Johnston carried the puck into the zone and dropped it back to Rantanen along the right boards. Rantanen sent a diagonal backdoor pass to Duchene for the tip-in redirection at the left post.

Back gave Dallas a 2-1 lead at 6:12 of third period, when he deflected Radek Faska’s point shot past Forsberg from the low slot.

Rantanen increased the lead to 3-1 with 3:49 left in the game. He entered the zone on the right side, cut to the middle and scored with a snap shot from the slot.

With Forsberg pulled for the extra skater, Johnston scored into an empty with 32 seconds remaining for the 4-1 final.

“I thought we played a good 40 minutes,” Kings defenseman Drew Doughty told NHL.com. “Third period, just gave up a little too much, obviously. Got to put a 60-minute game together.”

The offensive slump remains their issue. The Kings have scored two goals or fewer in six of their past eight games and are 1-3-2 in those games. Doughty said they are still not doing enough to create pressure in and around the crease that can result in more scoring.

“To be honest, I thought we created a little more chances,” Doughty told NHL.com. “We tweaked a couple things in our system that helped us with breakouts, and I thought that the ‘D’ were able to get more involved, and we had more four-man attacks, so I thought that was a bright spot. But, yeah, the bottom line is we’re not putting pucks in the net.”

UP NEXT

The Kings play at the Florida Panthers on Wednesday at 4 p.m. PT.