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Kings end five-game skid; Oilers drop eighth straight

Mar 13, 2007 - 6:35 AM LOS ANGELES (Ticker) -- Noah Clarke wasted little time adding to the misery of the Edmonton Oilers.

Clark scored his first career tally and Michael Cammalleri registered his fourth multi-goal game of the season to lead the Los Angeles Kings to a 5-1 victory over the slumping Oilers.

Although they officially were eliminated from playoff contention when the Calgary Flames defeated the St. Louis Blues earlier Monday, the Kings snapped a five-game losing streak while handing the Oilers their eighth straight defeat.

"It's nice to see our team get a payoff," Kings coach Marc Crawford said. "We know that it was a depleted lineup on both sides tonight. I thought that we needed energy in the game. ... When you get that, it allows the rest of the guys to go out and play a pretty good skill game, a pretty good puck-possession game."

Clarke opened the scoring with his initial tally at 2:05 of the first period by sliding the puck from the left faceoff circle past netminder Jussi Markkanen.

"I remember going to pee-wee and bantam tournaments and having people sneer and say, 'California kids can't play hockey,'" said Clarke, a native of La Verne. "So it's an incredible feeling to score my first goal playing for the Kings, playing here in Los Angeles."

Alexander Frolov doubled the advantage with his 34th goal nearly 3 1/2 minutes later, when he fired the rebound of defenseman Aaron Miller's shot by Markkanen, whose stick had broken on Miller's blast.

After Toby Petersen halved the deficit on a shorthanded breakaway midway through the first period, Cammalleri netted his 28th goal at 9:39 of the middle session, finding the top right corner of the net from the right circle.

Despite scoring 11 goals in his last 12 games, Cammalleri elected to give credit for the win to Los Angeles' fourth line.

"(John) Zeiler, (Raitis) Ivanans and (Gabe) Gauthier, that line really set the tone for us," Cammalleri said. "They were hitting everything in sight. They must have been awful to play against. They made their defense want to turn pucks over and not want to take hits. They were punishing."

Blue-liner Rob Blake added an insurance tally with 6:13 left. It was his 12th of the season and 150th with the Kings, tying him with Ziggy Palffy for 11th place in franchise history.

Cammalleri added his second goal of the game two minutes later and goaltender Mathieu Garon made 26 saves for the Kings.

Markkanen stopped 31 shots for Edmonton, which is winless since February 23 and has been outscored, 32-6, during the slide.

"All you can do is try to stay positive and work hard," Petersen said. "That's what we're doing. It's simple. ... At times, it can be hard to see the positives, but you have to keep working and try to move forward."

"I'm not saying we're snake-bit," Oilers coach Craig MacTavish said. "It's a product of what we have on the ice right now. We're having a hard time getting the shots through from the back end and we aren't giving ourselves a chance to get lucky. It's just frustrating."