There’s Plenty of Work, if Not Wins, for Fiset

He has faced 327 shots in 11 games in a month, stopping 296 of them, many with moves that might make a gymnast jealous.

And he has spent time between games in the training room, working out the kinks in a season that has had plenty of them, to get ready for another night in goal. Lately there hasn’t been much help because the Kings decided a month ago that they were going to try to ride a goalie into the playoffs.

Or not.

“Every day is different,” Stephane Fiset said. “One day I feel tight and sore, and the next day I feel perfect.”

He’s had to be perfect because there hasn’t been much help. The Kings have lost six of their last seven games after making noise about a playoff run, and Fiset has been the losing goalie in five of them.

In those games they have scored seven times.

In his 36 appearances, the Kings have averaged 2.25 goals and scored two or fewer goals 21 times.

He has a 2.53 goals-against average, more than respectable, if not exactly in Ron Tugnutt territory. The arithmetic makes Fiset’s 14-20-1 record easier to understand.

“Our problem this season hasn’t been goaltenders,” Coach Larry Robinson said.

It has been scoring.

There isn’t much Fiset can say about it.

“It’s my job to keep the team in the game, especially when you have a chance at the playoffs,” he said. “It is hard when the team scores only one or two goals, but it’s my job so I just have to keep working hard.”

With that in mind, he trots out night after night, then rehabilitates the groin strain he has lived with since the fourth game. And he asks for no time off.

“As much as they want to play me, I’m going to be ready to play,” he said.

Others around him apparently have made a different decision. After a lackluster 4-1 loss Monday at Colorado, Robinson indicated as much.

“Some of them are just playing it out,” he said.

Fiset can’t afford to. He’s in the final year of a contract that pays him $1.115 million this season, and at 28, he’s looking for a deal that might bridge the gap between now and unrestricted free agency.

“There are some guys who are working hard on the ice and you can see it, and if some guys have packed it in, that’s their problem,” Fiset said. “We’ve got some guys who are working hard for a new deal and it’s bad for the guys who don’t work hard. Some players aren’t going to have a job next year.”

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The Kings’ doctor, Ronald Kvitne, examined backup goalie Jamie Storr’s ankle, confirmed it is sprained and described Storr’s availability as week to week.