Kings’ Mikey Anderson exits game with upper-body injury

The Los Angeles Kings caught a tough break on the injury front on Sunday, as defenseman Mikey Anderson left the team’s matinee against the Carolina Hurricanes with a lower-body injury.

During the first period, Anderson left the Los Angeles bench before the team announced that he had been ruled out for the remainder of the contest. Anderson was skating on the Kings’ top pairing alongside veteran Drew Doughty.

Anderson recorded just 2:50 of ice time before his exit, and he was on the receiving end of a two-minute minor penalty for boarding by Hurricanes forward Jordan Martinook.

A fourth-round pick in the 2017 NHL Draft who has blossomed into a quality blue liner that provides Los Angeles with plenty of stability, Anderson has 9 points on 2 goals and 7 assists in his 53 appearances this season while skating to a plus-4 rating on an average of 20:20 of time on ice per game.

With Anderson sidelined and the Kings down to five defensemen, Brian Dumoulin drew the majority of the shifts alongside Doughty on the top unit.

Los Angeles is in a snowy Raleigh, NC on Sunday to close out a five-game road trip that has featured prior stops in St. Louis, Detroit, Buffalo and Philadelphia. A showdown with Columbus was scheduled for this past Monday, but it was postponed until March 9 due to hazardous winter weather-related conditions in central Ohio.

The Kings have put together a 3-1-0 record on the road trip prior to their showdown with the Hurricanes, who lead the Metropolitan Division.

Los Angeles’ strong showing on the road trip has bolstered their positioning in a tight race for both the Western Conference wild card spots and the Pacific Division’s playoff spots.

Entering Sunday’s slate, Los Angeles held the second wild card spot with a 23-17-13 record.