Kings win! Kings win!

The LA Kings have never gone 0-4 in franchise history to start a season, and to every Kings fan’s delight, that is a statistic that’s still true! It was the Kings first win of the season, four games in, yet somehow it seemed like we’ve been playing for months without a win. And for the first half of the first period, it seemed like it’d be another few. There was far too much action in the Kings zone, and not enough net front presence in the Wild zone. The Kings had the first power play but as per the Kings form, they didn’t do much with it. Depressing stat of the evening – the Kings were 0 for 14 on the power play. Jake Muzzin had a hard time connecting with the puck, and as the power play ended it looked like the Wild were going to take the lead; Anze Kopitar loses his stick, the Wild gets the breakaway and even a dive from Drew Doughty in front of the puck didn’t stop them from having a point blank shot at the net. Jonathan Quick stopped it from being a goal – he was stellar this evening.

The Kings went straight from a power play to a penalty kill within seconds. Huzzah however, because like most everything this evening, the Kings were on form. They killed the penalty easily, especially considering it was Drew Doughty in the box for boarding. Derek Forbort, who made his NHL debut in this game, stood out the first period making smart plays to keep the puck in the zone – he and Doughty made a nice defensive pairing. The offense seemed to be stepping up their game as it progressed; by the end of the first period the Kings had 16 shots on goal and over 20 shot attempts – a total greater than the shots on goal they had during the entirety of the last game.

The Kings started the 2nd period with 1:25 of a power play, which resulted in the Kings first goal since Tyler Tofolli’s shorthanded goal almost 6 periods ago, and first lead in over 3 games. Of course it was Tofolli again, a beautiful shot over Wild goalie Darcy Kuemper’s left shoulder. Milan Lucic picked up his first assist in a Kings uniform. The rest of the period was all Kings. Huge amounts of zone time. Lots of great looks at the net. Hustling players. One penalty kill was so good it looked like the Kings were just playing with the Wild. Pearson came so. darn. close. to making it 2-0 when Kuemper slid to his stomach on the right and left a huge hole ripe for the puck to slide past on his left, but Pearson fanned on the backhanded shot and had to settle for another power play instead, their third of the period with 11:12 remaining. (Delay of game, my least favorite penalty.) By the end of the period the Kings had 11 shots on goal during their eventual four power plays.

The tide started to turn back to the Wild towards the end of the second when Forbert was unfairly penalized for tripping (the linesman close to the play saw that the Wild player simply tripped while Forbert was in the vicinity, while the referee further across the ice called it.) By all accounts the Kings – outshooting the Wild 32-14 – should have been up by a much greater margin. The third period was disappointing, to say the least. It began with a missed interference call against the Wild, followed by a legitimate call against Nick Shore for tripping, and some scuffles after the play. In a move that was completely predictable, the Wild scored. In a ‘fun’ scoreboard glitch the Kings appeared to be down 998 goals. Easy to come back from right? Two more offensive zone penalties later the Kings were in a precarious position. They had been passive on their defense for most of the penalty kills. Quick had to make some impressive saves (which he did – so refreshing to see Quick on his game.) The puck had been in their zone more often than not, and the final penalty – high sticking by Nolan – came with 2:03 left to play. (Not gonna lie, I cursed him a little but as that play happened.)

But! The Kings managed to hold on to force their first real 3 on 3 overtime, and guaranteeing at least one point for the first time this season. Fans all over the stadium were ecstatic! Overtime began with Kopitar, Gaborik and Doughty, who made some great plays. The puck passed to Carter, Tofolli and Martinez who spent an extended period of time in the Wild zone – so extended we almost had to score. Finally Kopitar, Pearson and Muzzin took over. Kopitar ended it with a snipe from center that landed in the back of the net in between Kuemper’s right glove and pad. So beautiful. The goal looked like it may be under review for offsides, but Pearson’s smart skating proved to pay off and the Kings officially won their first game of the season. Rejoice! The sky isn’t falling Kings fans!