Kings Fall Short Against Jets in Overtime : 4-Game Winning Streak Ends as Elynuik’s Goal Lifts Winnipeg, 5-4

When King goalie Glenn Healy reached out to pluck Andrew McBain’s shot from the air with just 4 seconds left in regulation, preserving a tie against the Winnipeg Jets, it seemed that his luck had changed.

Sure, he had struggled through the early going Tuesday night. He had faced 23 shots in the first period alone, the most allowed by the Kings in a period this season. And he had faced boos from some of the 13,319 Forum fans toward the end of the second period, when the Jets took a 4-1 lead.

But that save seemed like the kind that turns a game around.

Not so.

Just 1 minute 11 seconds into overtime, King defenseman Doug Crossman fired a shot that was blocked by Pat Elynuik, a Winnipeg rookie right winger. The puck bounced toward the Kings’ goal, and Elynuik went with it on a breakaway, sending a 15-foot shot past Healy on the glove side for his second goal of the game and a 5-4 overtime victory over the Kings.

“Usually after a big save like that, the guys rebound with a goal,” Healy said. “It just didn’t happen tonight.”

Jet Coach Dan Maloney said, “They were sending all five men on the attack, and the puck bounced loose.

“L.A. always has their defense up pretty tight to the play all the time, and from what I can see, it happened pretty quickly. Pat was covering high, and he took off down the middle.”

Healy said Elynuik’s shot hit his pants and trickled over the top.

King Coach Robbie Ftorek, who was back behind the bench after watching a couple of games from the press box, said he thought the Jets got a break on the goal.

“But they worked for it,” he said.

The loss, the Kings’ first in overtime after 2 victories--they are the only team in the National Hockey League without a tie--ended their 4-game winning streak. The Jets are 3-1-4 in overtime games this season.

The Kings have yet to win an overtime game over the Jets, a team that specializes in the extra period. Last season, the Jets went 8-2-11 in overtime.

The Kings (19-9) had to mount a full-scale comeback just to get to that point.

Maloney said: “It was one of those games where I thought we were well in control, but L.A., being a great team as they are, came battling back, and the big guy (Wayne Gretzky) got them going with the 4-3 goal. We held our composure with a couple of good opportunities in overtime, and Pat Elynuik came through for us big.”

The Jets are 11-9-4--not a bad record for a last-place team, and they are in the Smythe Division, the toughest division in the league.

Last season the Kings were one of the weak links in the division. That’s not the case now, and nobody is going to come into the Forum expecting to win easily.

King defenseman Steve Duchesne said: “They used to come here to go to the beach and have fun. Now they know the Kings are a tough team.”

It just took the Kings awhile to get tough Tuesday.

After Crossman’s goal cut the deficit to 4-2 late in the second period, the Kings added 2 goals and shut out the Jets in the third period to tie the game.

Gretzky brought the Kings within a goal at 3:34 of the third period, taking the puck at the blue line and skating through the right circle to beat Pokey Reddick. Bob Carpenter brought the crowd to life when he scored the tying goal on a power play at 6:08.

Until then, the Kings had been having a long night, as their offense had not been offsetting the struggling Healy.

Healy went into the game with a record of 14-7, a winning percentage that was more a result of the Kings’ prolific offense than Healy’s 3.80 goals-against average.

The Kings were playing in the wrong end most of the night. At the end of 2 periods, they had taken just 18 shots to the Jets’ 34.

Healy gave up the first goal to Laurie Boschman just 2:37 into the game, letting a deflection skip past him.

Luc Robitaille tied it, 1-1, on a power-play goal, directing in a shot that Gretzky had launched from straight out. But the Jets had the lead again at the end of the period after Elynuik’s power-play goal at 15:45.

Former King Paul Fenton gave the Jets a 3-1 lead at 12:28 of the second period, sweeping the puck around the left side of Healy. And Brent Ashton added a goal, skating in on Healy from the right side to extend the lead to 4-1 before Crossman began the Kings’ comeback.

“This loss was probably the toughest to accept, losing like that in overtime after the comeback,” said Healy, who faced 42 shots to Reddick’s 31. “We were in a hole early, and we came back. . . . It didn’t seem like we were ready to play in the first period.”

King Notes

King center Mike Krushelnyski received a 5-minute penalty and an automatic game misconduct at 6:05 of the second period for an apparently inadvertent high stick that caught Jet defenseman Teppo Numminen above the left eye. Numminen suffered a laceration of the upper left eyelid that was stitched up so that he could return to the game. . . . The Kings’ scoring streak reached 200 games Tuesday. They have not been shut out since March 12, 1986. . . . Saturday night against Chicago, Bernie Nicholls got his 600th point when he was credited with the assist on Wayne Gretzky’s empty-net goal. Nicholls is just the fourth King to score 600 points. . . . Between the first and second periods, Gretzky picked up the team’s award for player of the month of October, and Nicholls picked up the award for player of the month of November. . . . Left winger Paul Fenton, who scored for the Jets Tuesday night, was traded to the Jets from the Kings on Nov. 25 for left winger Gilles Hamel. . . . The Jets and Kings will play again at the Forum on Thursday night.