Vegas Knights Best Kings in OT
- Updated: December 29, 2017
So as we predicted at the beginning of the season the LA Kings and the Vegas Golden Knights were battling for the top spot in the Pacific Division come the close of 2017. Wait, what? The expansion team was doing ridiculously well and not so bad on the road either: with a 9-7-1 record going in the Kings had their work cut out for them. Of course, they couldn’t start before they recognized Dustin Brown’s accomplishment of 1000 games, all with the LA Kings, a milestone he actually reached last game against the Avalanche but the Kings were celebrating Marian Gaborik’s feat of 1000 games himself. 3000 hits in 1000 games, 2 Stanley Cups… Brown it’s been a pleasure watching you play.
The Kings set the pace to begin with, with several major pushes from the Iafallo/Kempe/Toffoli line. Twice Kempe’s speed allowed him to be the first at the net and draw defensemen to him, while flicking off a pass to Iafallo who twice just couldn’t convert. The Kings took the first penalty, at which point my eyes rolled so hard back in my head they practically hurt. Though all I saw was a clean MacDermid hit not interference. With 17 seconds left in a solid penalty kill Brown joined him in the box, but since Perron did too there was no dreaded 5 on 3. In fact once MacDermid returned it was 5 on 5 instead of having usual 4 on 4 coincidental minor. Finally, it seemed, with the Iafallo/Kempe combo coming so close so many times, the Kings stuck first! Drew Doughty, who was praised by Brown in a piece he wrote about his 1000 games as a King, created the opportunity with a spinning backhanded pass entering the zone, allowing Forbert, still on the blue line, to snap a shot off up high and over Fleury’s head. It would have been his first NHL goal, if not for the late correction that credited Marian Gaborik with the deflection in. Brodzinski came close to making it two, on a play he lost control of ganging the zone, what with three Knights swarming him, but with some grit he manage to regain possession and snap off a shot that would have gotten past a goaltender who wasn’t a Stanley Cup Champ. The Kings lost a little control after that, as we begrudgingly saw again the inability to close out a period. Vegas had a few too many quality chances and even Quick didn’t know where the puck was a few times. Not quite ready to give up on the period though was Tyler Toffoli, who could have closed it out with a goal (and probably should have), as he was in the exact right space to Fleury’s blocker side to see the space in between his skate and the net, and put the puck there: I still don’t know how he didn’t.
The second period was not the Kings finest 20 minutes. Vegas outshot them 15-3 (a feat considering the Kings only picked up 2 penalties this period, one after a particularly confusing sequence where no one seemed to know what the puck was doing and somehow at the end of it Trevor Lewis was called for tripping.) Mitchell was a standout, not just in the second, for always being in the right place at the right time, making clean passes, nice blocks (especially considering he’s not a defenseman) and timely clears on the penalty kill. He and Quick were really the only two Kings who seemed to have it together, but even Quick couldn’t keep Vegas off the board. He tried, but short of actually using the Force to keep it out, it wasn’t happening. Of course, it came almost as the Kings had weathered the storm, with 1:26 remaining.
Quick clearly had something to say to the ref about that, or something else, can’t be sure, but clearly, the ref didn’t like it because when the Kings came back to begin the third, he had an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. Which would have been fine, I suppose, had Doughty (who otherwise was having a great game as usual) not taken another penalty with 1:21 of Quick’s remaining. Hardly what you want, having your best defenseman in the box for that long of a 5-on-3, yet the Kings still managed to pull it off. Quite spectacularly actually. The Kempe penalty (at which point I was actually wanting to cry foul on the refs, because I, and I was not alone in this, was not seeing what they were) was killed off even more spectacularly, with the Kings getting more shorthanded bids than Vegas had. However, it wasn’t enough, as it was clear Vegas was circling a goal and sure enough. With 8:50 remaining Vegas was buzzing and Leipsic wristed one past Quick. It didn’t bode well for two stingy defensive teams, with so few minutes remaining. That didn’t mean the Kings would give up. It’s just not their style. And with a 25+ goal differential in the third, perhaps a tying goal was also inevitable. It didn’t come on the rare Vegas penalty (though that did give the Kings momentum, as it took Vegas 1:24 to even be able to clear the puck.) The equalizer came from Doughty, who had just the right angle to deflect Muzzin’s shot in past Fleury. (This wasn’t your usual tip in, the geometry involved was incredible.) Overtime really isn’t what you want against a divisional rival (ugh how are Vegas a legit rival already?) nor was a loss, so at least the Kings got one point from the defeat. It was unfortunate, they had most of the possession and chances in the 3-on-3 (which really is just beautiful hockey to watch). But it was not to be. Still, the Kings leave 2017 in second place in the division, fifth place in the league and third in the conference. Not a bad place to be.
Stay with us at Calisportsnews.com as we will keep you up-to-date on all things Los Angeles Kings and the rest of the LA sports teams! All Cali, All the time
Related Posts
About Emily Redenbach
