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Roche's late goal lifts Coyotes over Kings

Jan 21, 2007 - 8:22 AM LOS ANGELES (Ticker) -- Travis Roche has not scored many goals this season, but he picked a great time to produce his latest.

Roche netted the game-winning goal with just 1:39 remaining as the Phoenix Coyotes rallied for a 3-2 victory over the Los Angeles Kings.

The Coyotes improved to 2-4-0 in their last six games and snapped a two-game losing streak.

"It was a long game, but we stayed focused for 60 minutes and won the game," Coyotes center Steven Reinprecht said. "It's nice to have a game like this going into the All-Star break. Now we can start the final third of the season with some confidence."

"Maybe it's a good thing that the All-Star break is coming up right now," Los Angeles rookie center Anze Kopitar said. "We have got to clear our heads and concentrate on the next game."

Roche scored his fifth of the season when his slap shot from the left point went through a maze of players and squeezed through Yutaka Fukufuji's pads for a 3-2 lead.

"We made some mistakes early but we stuck with it and kept going," Roche said. "We took it to them in the third period, and got some fortunate bounces."

Phoenix had tied the game when Ladislav Nagy streaked down the right side and blasted a shot from the right faceoff dot that deflected off Fukufuji's glove into the net at 13:58 of the third period.

Nagy had not recorded a goal in his previous seven contests.

Josh Gratton scored the other goal for the Coyotes, his first tally of the season in 28 games.

Alexander Frolov and Kopitar scored for the Kings, who fell to 0-7-1 in their last eight games.

Kopitar scored his 13th of the season shorthanded when he streaked down the right side and went behind the goal line before reaching back and stuffing the puck past Mikael Tellqvist at 5:46 of the first period.

"We've seen stuff like that all year long from him," Los Angeles defenseman Mattias Norstrom said of Kopitar. "That was a special goal that he scored tonight. It's going to be scary to see what he's going to become."

Tellqvist, who finished with 28 saves, raised his record to 5-2-0 in his last seven games.

Sean Burke, whom the Kings claimed off waivers from the Tampa Bay Lightning on Thursday, started and made 23 saves before leaving with exhaustion with 16:40 left in the third period.

"I felt good," Burke said. "I kept it simple and I felt that I was going to have good energy. I was a little concerned about my game conditioning since I haven't played for close to two months in a game. That combined with the tough week of travel, I just felt dehydrated to the point where I wasn't able to finish."

The Coyotes, who entered with the NHL's 26th-ranked power play, went 1-for-6 with the extra skater while the Kings were blanked in their eight attempts.

Before the game, the Kings officially retired Luc Robitaille's No. 20. Robitaille, a ninth-round draft choice of Los Angeles in 1984, went on to score 668 goals, the 10th-highest total in NHL history. He scored 557 of those goals in his 14 seasons with the Kings.

Robitaille, the highest-scoring left wing in league history with 1,394 points, retired last spring after 19 seasons and 1,431 games.