Mammoth not making excuses after 4-2 loss to Kings

The Utah Mammoth are finally home from their tour of North America, but that doesn’t mean things will be easier for them.

They learned that with their 4-2 loss to the Los Angeles Kings at the Delta Center on Monday. Here’s the story.

Quick catchup

Los Angeles Kings: 4

Utah Mammoth: 2

A two-goal deficit is one of the worst ways to start a hockey game, but that’s challenge the Mammoth faced in this one.

Both of the Kings’ early goals came off of odd-man rushes — a 3-on-2 which turned into a partial break for Adrian Kempe and a full-on breakaway for Joel Armia.

Brandon Tanev answered with a breakaway goal of his own to cut the Kings’ lead in half, but a successful offside challenge took the tally off the board.

Dylan Guenther opened the second period with a power play one-timer goal, but Anže Kopitar restored the Kings’ two-goal lead at the beginning of the third.

The Mammoth pulled back within one courtesy of a sweet backhander by Clayton Keller, but their 6-on-5 struggles continued as Armia sent one into the empty net.

Tidbits and takeaways

Bad starts

The culprit in the Mammoth’s last two games has been bad first periods.

In Calgary on Saturday, the Flames scored what ended up being the game-winning goal 16 seconds into the game. It wasn’t quite as drastic against the Kings on Monday, but allowing them to take a 2-0 lead into the first intermission created a hole that was hard to get out of.

“In the first period, we definitely gave them too much space,” said Utah head coach André Tourginy. “We let them take the middle on the rush, so they had too many (zone) entries. ... By giving them the lead, that made them play their strengths even more.”

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While the Mammoth have historically been good in the first period and awful in the second, the last handful of games have been the opposite.

Up to and including their loss in San Jose on Dec. 1, the Mammoth had a -13 goal differential in second periods. Over the last four games, however, they’re +4 in the middle frame — and they haven’t given up a single second-period goal in that stretch.

It would be easy to blame poor starts on the tough travel: seven games spanning four states and two provinces in the last 11 days, but Tourigny didn’t take that option.

“I don’t want to use that as an excuse,” he said. “It’s there, but so (it is for) the other team. (In the) NHL, there’s nobody who will feel sorry for you. It’s not a league where you have to find excuses — it’s not like that. You need to find solutions, you need to find a way."

One-goal games

Tourigny has frequently mentioned the parity in the NHL: On most given nights, the bulk of the games will be decided by just one goal (excluding empty-netters).

Since the beginning of November, 10 of the Mammoth’s 14 losses have been exactly that way. That should encourage players and fans alike: They’re one good play short of better outcomes in most of these situations.

They just need one more guy to step up every night.

Tourigny couldn’t point to a particular pattern that has led to so many one-goal losses, but speaking on this game in particular, he broke down the Kings’ second goal, when Armia snuck in behind Utah’s defensemen before accepting a stretch pass to send him on a breakaway.

“The second goal should have never happened,” Tourigny said. “We’re casual, and that’s the difference in the game. That’s how tight the league is.”

That should be encouraging for Mammoth fans: This isn’t a matter of skill, it’s a matter of consistency — and it is a surmountable problem.

Another shift or two of buy-in from each line is all it’s going to take for Utah to come out on the winning side of the bulk of these games.

A note on the coaching staff

Mammoth social media circles have been filled with requests for a coaching change, but Keller shut that idea down in his postgame interview.

“We know what we need to do each night. The coaches do a great job of telling us how we have to play and how we can break them down and have success,” he said.

“I think our execution was a little sloppy tonight, but as the game went on, I think it got a little bit better.”

As mentioned after the team’s loss in San Jose last week, coaching changes typically only happen when the players stop buying into the coaches’ messages. As captain, part of Keller’s job is to speak for the players — and right now, the players are saying that coaching isn’t the problem.

The onus is now on Keller and the other 22 players on the roster to show that this is the group that it’ll take to accomplish their stated goal of making the playoffs this season.

Goal of the game

Keller’s backhander

NHL Edge doesn’t publicly keep track of the league’s hardest backhanders, but if it did, Keller’s goal may have been atop the list.

The backhander is the most difficult shot to take with any degree of strength or accuracy, which is why they almost exclusively happen from in tight. But this one was good enough to beat 2025 Vezina Trophy finalist Darcy Kuemper point-blank.