Yegor Sharangovich scored the go-ahead goal at 12:09 of the third period as the Calgary Flames earned their fourth straight win, 4-2, over the Kings on Tuesday night.
Andrew Mangiapane, Blake Coleman and Mikael Backlund, into an empty net, also scored for Calgary, and Chris Tanev chipped in a pair of assists. The Flames remain five points back of Nashville for the second wild-card playoff spot in the Western Conference.
Goalie Jacob Markstrom made 21 saves and had an assist.
Phillip Danault and Kevin Fiala provided the offense for the Kings, who have dropped the first two games of their three-game Western Canada trip. The Kings are tied in points with Nashville but hold the first wild-card spot for having two games in hand.
Making his first start in four games, Cam Talbot, a former Flames player, had 33 saves for the Kings.
On the go-ahead score, Sharangovich took a pass from Dryden Hunt, strode over the Kings blue line and ripped a shot inside the goalpost on Talbot’s glove side.
Scoreless through the first half of the game, the Kings opened the scoring at 12:08 of the second period when Danault picked the top corner with a slap shot from 40 feet.
The lead was short-lived, however, with Calgary responding 48 seconds later.
Noah Hanifin’s long pass found Mangiapane behind the Kings’ defense and on the breakaway, he fooled Talbot with a backhand-to-forehand deke that left him with an empty net to score his 12th goal of the season.
Continuing the sudden rapid-fire scoring barrage, 56 seconds after that, the Flames took their first lead with Coleman knocking in a Jonathan Huberdeau rebound at 13:52.
Fiala evened the scored with 1:06 remaining in the middle frame, backhanding in a rebound after Markstrom could not control Anze Kopitar’s initial shot.
With the Kings playing on back-to-back nights, Calgary started strong. The Flames outshot the Kings 10-3 in the opening 20 minutes, but the game remained scoreless thanks to the Kings’ penalty-kill unit that bent but didn’t break.
Mangiapane played in his 400th career game. Drafted by Calgary in the sixth round (166th overall) of the 2015 draft, he’s one of only 13 active players drafted in the sixth round who has reached 400 games. He’s also the first from the sixth round of his draft class to reach that mark.
With his assist on Mangiapane’s goal, Markstrom has five assists this season. No other NHL goalie has more than two.
Up next
Kings finish a three-game trip at Western Conference-leading Vancouver on Thursday.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
