West Notes: Kings, Stars Goaltending, Shaw

One of the bigger concerns for the Kings currently is a lack of secondary scoring, notes Elliott Teaford of the LA Daily News.  Through 26 games, they have just two players with more than five goals in Jeff Carter and Tanner Pearson.

Over the summer, the team lost Milan Lucic, Kris Versteeg, and Vincent Lecavalier and haven’t really had success replacing them.  It was hoped that Teddy Purcell would help at least cover the loss of one of Versteeg or Lecavalier but after collecting just two assists in 12 games, he cleared waivers and has been sent to the minors.

With Los Angeles currently in LTIR as a result of the injury to goaltender Jonathan Quick, they don’t have the financial flexibility to bring another scorer in so they will have to count on players like Anze Kopitar (two goals) and Tyler Toffoli (five goals) to pick up the slack and get back towards the level of production that they’ve provided in recent years.

[Related: Kings Depth Chart]

More from the West:

• The Stars are into their second year with Kari Lehtonen and Antti Niemi as their goaltending tandem, the most expensive in the league. In a reader mailbag, Mike Heika of the Dallas Morning News suggests that it might be in their best interest to move one of them instead of going with the ‘play the hot hand’ strategy that they are running.  He also feels that if they were to move one, they’d be better to deal Lehtonen even though he may be the more talented of the two.  However, he carries the higher cap hit ($5.9MM with a no-move clause through 2017-18 vs $4.5MM through 2017-18 for Niemi) and given the other goaltenders that are believed to be available, finding a desirable trade may be easier said than done.
• Ducks right winger Logan Shaw admitted to Eric Stephens of the Orange County Register that he was happy to be traded from the Panthers last month. Shaw failed to crack Florida’s lineup and cleared waivers at the beginning of the season but was flipped to Anaheim in a swap of AHL veterans.  Since being recalled on the 24th, he has played in all seven games with the Ducks, scoring once.  He has made a positive impression on head coach Randy Carlyle, who called Shaw “one of our brighter spots over the last little while”.  With the team placing Ryan Garbutt on waivers yesterday, it appears Shaw will be sticking around for a little while yet.