Kings 5, Wild 2: Scoring by Committee is Possible!

Hey, Minnesota, thanks for bringing your crappy weather to LA.  I had to put on a jacket today and that does not make me happy.

I was a little concerned today about which Kings team would show up tonight.  After awhile I finally decided that I would be happy with any outcome as long as the Kings didn't take more than 2 penalties.  Lately their lapse in discipline has been killing them since the Kings penalty kill is nowhere near as good as it was last year at this point in the season.  Last season I sorta didn't mind too much that the Kings couldn't score on the power play because at least they weren't allowing many goals against during the penalty kill.  The opposite is true this season.; the power play is finally clicking, but the penalty kill is not very awesome, which sucks since they've been taking so many damn penalties!

(Getty Images/Jeff Gross)

Best NHL Movember moustache? Indeed.

Here are three highs and three lows that I took away from the game.    Let's start with the negatives since I like ending on a positive note.

The Not-So-Low Lows:

1. The Kings did take more than 2 penalties, but at least they didn't run into penalty trouble until after they had established a wide lead.  Furthermore, I fully support penalties when you're standing up for your teammates for a dirty play.  On the replay of the Brad Staubitz checking Anze Kopitar, you could see that Staubitz swung his arm around after the check to try and hit Kopi in the face.  Uncool, dude.  So fucking uncool.  I was very happy to see Simon Gagne hurl himself onto Staubitz to stand up for Anze.  That was pretty sweet (and I mean sweet both as in awesome and adorable).
2. The Kings almost went scoreless through 3 consecutive power plays totaling 9 minutes.  But, with less than a minute remaining on the 5 minute major power play, Martinez fought off a Wild player to somehow get #stickonpuck to get the Kings a much needed power play goal.  This goal put the Kings up 2-0 and I wonder how different the game would have played out if the Wild had killed off that 5 minute major penalty.
3. The Kings kinda got lackadaisical in the third period.  The Kings need to channel the 2009 New Orleans Saints and learn to "Finish Strong".

It's always a relief anytime both Dany Heatley and Devon Setoguchi are invisible.  Let's be honest: the Wild looked like shit.  I don't believe for a second they are as bad of a team as they looked tonight.  I'm just glad the Kings were on top of their game.  There were many strong points in this game; here are three highs that stuck out to me:

1. Kings finally got "scoring by committee".  I mean c'mon, Colin Fraser scored!  Matt Greene scored! Anytime a 4th liner scores or a defenseman not named Drew Doughty or Jack Johnson scores will be a good game.  It got to the point that the crowd at Staples Center sounded like they expected any decent shot by any Kings player to go in. 
2. Minnesota didn't get a power play until 19:20 of the second period.  This was the Simon Gagne penalty that I described above and I think it's fine that he took the penalty even though the Wild eventually scored on that power play in the 3rd period.  The next Wild power play wasn't until 4:22 of the third period.  The Kings were disciplined, but still played aggressively and with lots of energy and intensity, especially early in the game.  I'm sure Jonathan Quick was relieved he didn't have to stand on his head through half the first period.
3. Not only did the Kings get scoring from unlikely sources, but they scored early!  None of this "cram amazing hockey into the last 15 minutes of the game" crap.  They started strong, built up a nice lead, and then held on to finish off the Wild.  

Feel free to add your highs and lows in the comments. Overall, a solid game by the Kings.  Well done boys!

Kings Gameday: The Oil are in Town

Fact: I've never liked the Edmonton Oilers.

I'll save my hate-fueled rant about the Oilers for another day.

Apparently the Edmonton Oilers have a couple of young sprightly talented hockey players.  You can follow their lives on Twitter: Taylor Hall & Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.  Both of these kids referred to California as "Cali".  I hate them already.

There's an article about RNH and his start in the NHL and comparisons to his days in Juniors.  It's all very inspiring and heartwarming, but the part that made my eyes bug out was the description of Edmonton having "the best goaltending in the NHL".  Guhhhh-WHAT?! Impossible! (say it in a French accent for a better effect.) Since when does Edmonton have the best goaltending?  I didn't trust the writer so I checked the NHL stats and sure enough our beloved Jonathan Quick has been bested in GAA and SV% by one goaltender: Nikolai Khabibulin.  Is anyone else shocked by this?  He goes from Tent City to top of the NHL in a matter of months.  That is crazy talk.  Also, this doesn't bode well for the scoring-challenged LA Kings.

I'm a bit frustrated, or maybe it's jealousy that's talking, to see Ryan Smyth with 10 points (5G, 5A) in 11 games.  You have got to be kidding me.  The guy had 7 points last season (3G, 4A) in 11 games and based on his play during the rest of the season, I figured his stats would continue to fall in the following season.  It pains me to see him doing this well considering there are some Kings who haven't yet contributed very many points.

LA Kings Insider reported on Wednesday that Simon Gagne will be back in the lineup, which means I can now restart my 'Anze for MVP' campaign. Anze has been most effective this season when Gagne is playing alongside him.  I expect at least 3 points from Anze tonight. Totally doable!

Things to watch for tonight:

• 5-on-5: will the Kings be able to dominate at even strength?
• Stupid penalties: Green has been good lately about staying out of the box, but now Parse is having trouble avoiding taking unnecessary penalties.  
• Turnovers: Recently the Kings have been shooting themselves in the skates by turning over the puck way too many times
• Penner vs. the Young Guns: Who will garner the most attention and will it be positive or negative?

I hope the Kings get out of their funk tonight.

Go Anze Go!

The Kings Home Opener was FANtastic!

The Kings home opener exceeded all of my very low expectations! I felt like a little kid again, super excited about the little things, like a beer garden, being able to walk across the closed-off-to-vehicular-traffic Chick Hearn street, magnet schedules, and especially watching the Kings win their home opener!

My Kings home opener celebration began a little earlier than I had initially anticipated because I was so antsy to leave work and get to LA Live. The Husband was starving and the Yard House was packed as usual so we made our way to Lawry's Carvery. They serve overpriced sandwiches but they're tasty (which I can't say about the food at the ESPN Zone) and they have $3 bottled beers, including Blue Moon and Stella Artois.

hmmm....beer.  it makes me happy.

The place was packed by the time we left, but the food does come out quick. We headed over to the Kings Fanfest beer garden for one last stop before heading into Staples Center. I'm glad we went because we got to witness the bottoms-up beer dispenser in full action!

Look Ma! It's Magic!

I had read about it last year on Puck Daddy, but never saw it at Staples Center. It definitely serves beer quicker and everyone around was amazed at this magical invention. I forgot about the magnetic "stopper", which you can definitely poke up into the cup. The husband was very tempted to drink the beer from the bottom of the cup, but common sense got the better of him.

Do it. Do it. Do it. 

I made a quick stop in the Team LA store. There was a Kopitar player t-shirt for women in black, but I really wanted a vintage grey Doughty player t-shirt, which the store didn't carry. Instead of buying stuff I walked around the store and made fun of the hideous shirts including this one:

brought to you by Ed Hardy

The Husband was really smitten with this baby/toddler tracksuit even though we don't have any kids and are several years away from having any:

why was my husband looking at kids clothes? i don't know....

I'm also not sure how I feel about dressing up a kid in a tracksuit. A bib and a onesie are acceptable, but a tracksuit? Umm...we're not Italian.

I really enjoyed the player intros. I was wondering what this device was:

What could that possibly be?

And then we soon found out:

now that's pretty cool, right?

Last season before the Kings entered the ice, there was this horrible animation that would play on the jumbotron. My description won't do it justice, but it consisted of animated medieval soldiers going to war and they carried flags that showed the teams' logos and one of the Kings soldiers would shoot the puck and it hit the opposing team and shattered them. Something like that. Trust me, it was terrible. Thankfully, it was not played last night and hopefully it will never be shown ever again. It was super cheesy and I cringed every time I saw it.

Another absence I appreciated? Davis Gaines didn't sing the national anthem!

The game was fantastic as well! I sat in one of the sections behind the goal where the Kings shoot twice. From that viewpoint I was able to clearly see how the Kings break out of their zone. I was impressed with how well they were passing to each other and it seemed like they were really trying to open the game up by playing laterally, making a lot of cross-ice passes, even in tight situations. There were a couple close calls when a defenseman made a cross-ice pass literally a stick's length in front of Quick, but they were confident passes. It probably helped that the Blues were playing their 3rd game in 4 nights (thanks NHL scheduler!) because the Kings looked fresh and fast. Quick was on fire and tracked the puck really well even when there were multiple deflections.

Whenever I'm at the game it always seems like there are a lot of phantom penalties being called since you only get one look at it from one angle. Last night it seemed like several penalties called on both teams were ticky-tacky, but at least it wasn't one-sided. I really enjoyed watching Dustin Brown rough it up with the Blues and draw a penalty. The Captain's got a great talent! During the coaching staff intros, the Husband asked why people were booing Jamie Kompon so I had to explain about how the power play has been pretty terrible the past couple seasons so the majority of the fans blame Kompon. Well, it seems like the fans are going to have to eat crow because the Kings power play is getting the job done. We can't expect the Kings to score on every power play, but so far the Kings have had two game-winning power play goals (thanks, Jack!) and last night the power play looked pretty good most of the time.

Here are some quick and dirty thoughts about a couple players' performances:

Kopitar: Another great game. I can't get over how amazing he looks this season. Is it too early to start the "Anze for MVP" rally?

Brown: He did all the work on Stoll's goal, including setting it up perfectly and drew at least one penalty.

Gagne: He really exploded tonight.

Penner: I saw him in warm-ups and I couldn't help but imagine him whining to Coach Murray that he couldn't play because of some injury and Murray rolling his eyes and telling him to put a band-aid on it. I don't think Penner had that great of a game. I mostly noticed him when he was standing at the blue line and someone would pass it to him and he would just deflect it into the offensive zone and then skate off for a line change. I doubt he's 100% right now, but he still needs to be better because there's no crying in hockey!

Richards: I like him more and more with every game I watch. Do I see a Richards jersey in my future???

Voynov: The kid looks a lot bigger than the 5'-11" he's listed at. He had a pretty solid game tonight. If he keeps it up, once Doughty is healthy Martinez might need to book a flight to Manchester.

Quick: Like I said above, he had a fantastic game. He wasn't tested that much, but there definitely could have been some fluky goal off a second deflection, but Quick was all over the puck.

The only way this game could have been any better is if Gagne had a hat trick. Oh, and also if the hipster douchebags sitting in front of me didn't talk non-stop throughout the game about everything under the sun BUT hockey. Seriously, if you don't know anything about the game, then at least try to learn and if you're not going to pay attention, then LEAVE or at least don't talk so freaking loudly! (rant, done.)

It warmed my heart to see the fans standing through the last minute of the game cheering the Kings for putting on a great show. 5-0 against the Blues? Now that's how you start a season at home!