Consistency Still a Missing Ingredient

PHOENIX —  The Kings won four of five games against San Jose last season, yet finished four points behind the champion Sharks in the Pacific Division. This season, they have dominated the Dallas Stars in two shutout victories, yet started Sunday trailing the division-leading Stars by 10 points.

“It’s a matter of consistency,” defenseman Mathieu Schneider said of the Kings’ pursuit of their first division title since 1991. “We have to play the same way every night. That’s what those teams do, but we haven’t learned to do that, for whatever reason, over the past couple years. When we come up against weaker teams, we seem to struggle, whether it’s a mental thing, not being prepared, feeling too good about ourselves....

“We’ve risen to the occasion when we’ve needed to, but milking the cow and kicking over the bucket, we seem to do that pretty regularly.”

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Steve Heinze was put on injured reserve after suffering a concussion late in the third period of Saturday night’s 3-2 overtime victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins. Rookie Jared Aulin, acquired in the February 2001 trade that sent Rob Blake to the Colorado Avalanche, was recalled from the Kings’ American Hockey League team at Manchester, N.H., arrived about three hours before the game, skated in the warmups and then was scratched.... Eric Rasmussen was sidelined because of back spasms and Brad Chartrand returned to the lineup after sitting out four games.... With their 3-0 victories last week at Nashville and Dallas, the Kings posted consecutive road shutouts for the first time in club history.