Kings rise from the dead to even series with Oilers

LOS ANGELES — As far as coming back from the grave goes, the Los Angeles Kings kicked open the coffin lid with a vengeance Sunday that would have made Jason Voorhees proud.

Left for dead after being beaten 14-2 in Games 2 and 3, the Kings are back in Edmonton’s nightmares again after a 4-0 Game 4 victory at Crypto. com Arena that was straight out of a Friday the 13th sequel.

Instead of putting the series in a 3-1 stranglehold, suddenly it’s the Oilers who feel the icy hand of uncertainty tightening its grip around their necks in what is now a best of three coin toss.

Where did it get away from them?

“Pretty early in the game,” seethed Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, as unhappy as anyone with how Edmonton played. “They came out — we knew they were going to respond — and we were losing puck battles early. We were letting them get to our net too easily.

“They worked and we didn’t respond well enough early and that’s a tough team to come back on. We have to learn from this and move on to Game 5 at home.”

The Oilers have been saying for three days that it didn’t matter how badly they beat the Kings in Game 2, and how badly they beat them again in Game 3, this thing was far from over. Whether they believed it or not is something only they know, but most of the people watching this series didn’t.

They do now.

The Oilers are getting a firsthand look at the resilience of an LA team that refused to quit in the regular season when injuries devastated their lineup and certainly weren’t going to curl up after a couple of tough losses.