The LA Kings earned their first win of the preseason with a 3-2 victory over the Vegas Golden Knights on Wednesday night at T-Mobile Arena.

The Kings took a 2-0 lead at the end of the first period, scoring two goals in just 28 seconds to take the lead.

First, skating on the power play, forward Alex Laferriere opened his preseason account with the game’s first goal. Working from the top of the left circle, forward Kevin Fiala got the puck to the front of the net, where forward Alex Turcotte won a battle up front and served Laferriere, who buried it at the far post for a 1-0 lead.

Less than 30 seconds later, forward Tanner Jeannot made it 2-0 with his first goal in a Kings jersey. Skating in transition, forward Warren Foegele reached the offensive blue line and tossed a puck to Jeannot off the rush. Jeannot gathered in the right circle and fired a shot past Vegas goalie Ilya Samsonov for his first of the preseason and a two-goal lead going into the first half.

Early in the second period, the Golden Knights pulled a goal back in transition, courtesy of defenseman Noah Hanifin. The Kings were caught with four players under the puck in the offensive zone and Vegas took advantage, with forward Tanner Laczynski finding the open man, Hanifin, who fired home his team’s first goal, cutting the score to 2-1.

The Kings got that goal back, however, to go into the second half with a two-goal lead. Fiala started his second goal-scoring game of the night when he made a nifty move in the slot to create space for himself, with forward Warren Foegele eventually finishing the play from a tight space just outside the crease for his first goal of pre-season and a 3-1 lead. Fiala and Foegele each picked up their second points of the game, while forward Quinton Byfield also recorded an assist on the play.

The Kings made a planned goaltending change after 40 minutes, bringing on Carter George for Darcy Kuemper. Kuemper finished his night with 11 saves on 12 shots in his first preseason action.

Vegas pulled within a goal just over five minutes into the third period. Laferriere’s cross-ice pass was intercepted in the defensive zone by Laczynski, who beat new goalie George with a shot from the slot to extend the score and make it a one-goal game. George and the Kings held on from there for the 3-2 victory.

During the opening period, Kings defenseman Drew Doughty left the game with a lower-body injury and did not return. According to head coach Jim Hiller, there was no update on Doughty’s status after the game, other than the lower-body injury. The plan is to return to Los Angeles and “take a good look at it” with the Kings’ medical team. Until then, Hiller said, nothing is certain about Doughty’s status.

Listen to Jeannot, Foegele and Hiller after tonight’s game.

Warren Foegele

Browner Jeannot
About his impressions of his first practice match with the Kings
Yeah, I thought we came out pretty good. Everybody’s trying to learn the new system and just execute it. So it’s a lot of talking, a lot of building chemistry with lines, and I think the biggest thing is everybody just working hard. I thought everybody did really well tonight and we came out with a good result.

On the difficulties of playing after watching a player like Drew Doughty deteriorate the way he did
It’s something you never want to see, you know, we definitely felt it on the bench. Obviously he’s a leader on this team, he’s been there forever, it just sucks. I thought the guys just put that behind them and played the game and did their job. Now we can see how Dewey does and help him through it, I don’t know what’s going on yet, but just help him through it.

On continuing to build chemistry with Phillip Danault and Trevor Moore, and what he learned from Game 1 together
I’m really excited to play with those two. Obviously they’ve been playing together for a long time, they’ve built a lot of chemistry, so I just try to talk as much as I can, tell them my tendencies, try to figure out theirs and just talk it through so we can do the best we can and just lend my skills to what they do. It’s a good stepping stone tonight, and I just want to build on it.

On the interchangeability between him and Moore with the side of the ice
I think so, yeah, we’re both pretty comfortable on both sides, so it’s just whatever we want to do, I guess, whatever we’re feeling, and we just have to talk about it. So yeah, it’s pretty easy.

About his goal tonight and scoring from a distance with his shot
Most of my goals don’t come from that far out. I usually just bang the rebound in or something, but no, it was tough playing the d-zone, we got it out and we got an odd-man rush in there. Foegs made a good play to throw it back to me and I just used the D as a kind of screen to set up the shot and it went in for me.

Jim Hiller
Is there any update on Drew Doughty’s status?
No more than you already know. We’re going back home, we’re going to take another good look at it. Until we take another good look at it with our boys, we won’t know for sure.

On the challenges of a team getting back into the game after Doughty went down
Nobody feels good about that, you know, when you see a guy like that, everybody knows Drew is a warrior, he’s not going to leave the ice unless he’s hurt, that’s for sure. It’s disappointing because you don’t know, right? It’s the unknown. You’ve got to go out there and play, but I think it cost us a little bit of life in the second half of the game, that’s for sure. In the meantime, I thought Spence and Burroughs, the two right D’s that were left, got some minutes and had some pretty good games.

About his first impressions of the Fiala/Byfield/Foegele line
I thought they started off really well, that was obvious, the first period they were really good. Then with the power plays,. I thought we lost our flow a little bit in the second half of the game 5-on-5, so we probably took them out, but that first period was what we expected from them.

On seeing individual mistakes when conceding goals and how he assesses them in a practice match
Yeah, we look at our team play more than anything else and so the individual mistakes at this point are the individual mistakes. We have to make sure our team play is right and then of course those guys know they just can’t do that, that’s hockey 101. For the most part, our team play came from a bad change, one time we had a bad read in the neutral zone in the second, but I thought we did a pretty good job outside of that.

About the game of Carter George, who played two games as a young goalkeeper
Both games actually, what stands out to me is he looks very calm. He doesn’t waste a lot of movement and I loved how it ended for him. He had to hold the lead, boom, there was some traffic, he fought through the traffic, let it get to him. Just a really impressive performance from him in the second half, and really from Kuemps to start the game. He officially got the Kings jersey back, it’s been a long time for him and he definitely picked up where he left off with the Kings.

On Jordan Spence’s game and how he took a step forward this season
I think so. Spenny was a real offensive defenseman in the American League and we need him here to be a very solid defenseman. He’ll get points here and there, but we just need that defensive game, solid, predictable and I think that’s what he’s got to work on. Tonight I thought he did a pretty good job of that.