ROUNDLY FLAT PERFORMANCE FOR KINGS L.A. OUTPLAYED IN LOSS TO BUFFALO; PALFFY LEAVES GAME BUFFALO 5, KINGS 1.

Byline: Matt McHale Staff Writer

Kings coach Andy Murray gave Roman Cechmanek the night off after his emotional victory against Philadelphia. Murray didn't think the rest of his team would lay down as well.

For the first time in the young season the Kings were outworked and out finessed in Thursday night's 5-1 loss to the Buffalo Sabres in front of a booing crowd of 15,752 at Staples Center.

They already trailed by two goals when Ziggy Palffy, the NHL's leading scorer, was whacked in the chin by former King Adam Mair late in the first period. He later left the game with a cervical strain and will be re-examined today.

In the second period, Lubomir Visnovsky, the Kings' top defenseman in the early going, left with back spasms and did not return.

The Kings have played with injuries before. They have been playing without Jason Allison, Adam Deadmarsh, Aaron Miller and Mattias Norstrom. This time the passion was missing, too.

``We just didn't come out with any intensity,'' Kings winger Sean Avery said.

What made that more surprising was they already had outplayed teams with superior talent. They defeated powerful Philadelphia and Ottawa and lost in the final seconds against mighty Detroit.

Perhaps there was a letdown after Tuesday's 4-0 victory in Cechmanek's first game against his former team, the Flyers. But Buffalo was a very beatable team that came in with just eight goals in six games.

Instead, it was the Kings who looked out of sorts, allowing power-play goals to Miroslav Satan and Taylor Pyatt in the first period and a shorthanded goal to Curtis Brown with a minute left in the second.

Murray had called a timeout after Chris Taylor scored at 8:43 of the second period. The gritty Mair, a former third line winger for the Kings, worked the puck down low and took a shot at Christobal Huet. Taylor swiped at the puck and tipped it in.

The Kings seemed to pick it up at the beginning of the third period when Derek Armstrong took a pass from Luc Robitaille and beat Sabres goaltender Martin Biron at 1:15.

But they never threatened again. The Kings pulled their goaltender with four minutes left in the game, but Pyatt, a former King who was involved in the 1999 Palffy trade, scored a shorthanded empty-netter to cap the scoring.

Huet, Cechmanek's replacement, finished with 30 saves. Biron stopped 25 of 26 shots.

The game actually was over midway through the first period after Kip Brennan was whistled off for elbowing.

Satan scored the Sabres' first power-play goal after backhanding a rebound of Brown's shot in front of Huet.

Then the action got physical. Ian Laperriere and Brennan received fighting majors but the turning point came after a hit that wasn't called a penalty.

At 17:17 of the first period, Palffy came across the Sabres' zone and took a shoulder to the chin from Mair. Palffy hit the ice and was slow to get back in the play.

Less than two minutes later, Palffy retaliated by cross checking Rory Fitzpatrick. With another power-play opportunity, Buffalo went on the attack in the final seconds. Chris Drury fed Pyatt in front at 19:42 and the rout was on.

``That hit on Ziggy was dirty,'' Avery said. ``It was up to us to take care of that. We should have been 6-0 coming in to this game but there are times when we just don't play well.

Matt McHale, [phone]

matt.mchale(at)dailynews.com

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Photo:

Goaltender Christobal Huet allows a goal, one of five he gave up, Thursday night during the Kings' loss to the Buffalo Sabres.

Charlotte Schmid-Maybach/Staff Photographer