Kings hardly know what hit them

The mood was one of bewilderment.

The Kings trudged off the ice and hunkered down in their dressing room. A broken stick lay in the hallway outside and a loud bang came from the coach’s office.

In the span of six shots, their chance for a tidy two-game winning streak vanished Thursday night. The Philadelphia Flyers scored three goals in three minutes of the third period for a 4-3 victory in front of an announced 16,446 at Staples Center.

R.J. Umberger’s second of two goals gave the Flyers the lead 16:23 in, closing out a string of pratfalls, gaffes and shaky goaltending by the Kings. When the Flyers killed off the final frantic seconds, they had back-to-back victories for the first time this season and the Kings had some disturbing realizations.

“I don’t have a single answer for this,” Kings forward Scott Thornton said. “We’re a quarter of the way through the season and we’re still making mistakes that we should have stopped making 10 games ago. You can’t keep saying, ‘Let’s put this one behind us and move on.’ Until we start learning from these things we’re going to have a lot of ups and downs.”

This one certainly qualified as a down.

This seemed like a treat for the Kings. Finally a team they could look down on.

The Flyers have been so bad that general manager Bobby Clarke and coach Ken Hitchcock have already lost their jobs. Peter Forsberg is reported to be on the trading block. The team’s goaltenders ranked next to last in goals-allowed this season.

This seemed more like group therapy for two teams that have had issues.

The Flyers are off to their worst start in franchise history. The Kings can’t claim that, but they have been rubbing elbows with Western Conference doormats through the first quarter of the season.

But someone was going to get a victory, NHL rules required it.

“There is still an opportunity for us,” Chris Conroy said. “We’re not that far from the sixth-, seventh-, eighth-place teams. Obviously we have to play a lot better. There’s lots of time to turn this around.”

Yet, the Philadelphia story had a plot shift with a 7-4 victory over the Ducks on Wednesday. A series of unfortunate events by the Kings handed the Flyers a happy ending Thursday.

“We thought last night was our best game,” Umberger said. “This one is better.”

It didn’t seem that way 50 minutes into the game.

Alexander Frolov’s second goal gave the Kings a 3-1 lead 9:24 into the third period. The Kings were poised to tie Calgary for eighth place in the Western Conference

“All of sudden we have a two-goal lead and then we sat back,” goaltender Dan Cloutier said. “We’re not the type of team that can sit back and just hope.”

A turnover by defenseman Lubomir Visnovsky was turned into a goal by Simon Gagne. Dustin Brown’s turnover led to Umberger’s first goal. Umberger scored again after the puck deflected off defenseman Mattias Norstrom’s skate.

That funk seemed to continue even after the game.

“This was a tough one, there is no doubt about it,” Coach Marc Crawford said. “There is nothing you can say to make it easier on our fans, or in the room. We just have to make sure we learn the lesson quickly.”

chris.foster@latimes.com