Ducks return to same old tricks vs. Kings

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The Ducks are back to penalty-killing themselves. They committed six penalties during the second period, compared to one for the Kings and, guess what, Anaheim gave up two goals to fall behind, 3-2, at Staples Center.

Kings forward Patrick O’Sullivan, who has only been with the team a week after sitting out 2 1/2 weeks of training camp while negotiating a new contract, scored his first goal of the season to tie the score, 2-2.

O’Sullivan made a nice move on the goal, bringing the puck from behind the net and banking it off the skate of Ducks’ defenseman Chris Pronger. Anze Kopitar got an assist on the play, his first point of the season.

The Kings had two five-on-three opportunities in the period. They didn’t cash in on the first, but Jarret Stoll did on the second, swiping a slap shot up high on Jean-Sebastien Giguere’s glove side for his first goal as a King. Kopitar assisted on that one as well.

Some of the biggest cheers of the game have been directed at the new ice girls the Kings have employed this season. Always a step behind the rest of the NHL, I see.

On a more disturbing note, it was learned between the first and second period that Steve Kampfer, a fourth-round pick of the Ducks in 2007, suffered a fractured skull during an attack early Sunday morning by a Michigan football player, it was reported. Kampfer was a former teammate at Michigan with Kings’ defenseman Jack Johnson, who just happened to have surgery today for a torn labrum suffered Sunday night against San Jose.

When it rains it pours. It was also just announced that the Ducks’ first-round pick of 2006, defenseman Mark Mitera, also a member of the Wolverines, suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee during a game Friday night and will be sidelined indefinitely.

-- Dan Arritt