Dustin Brown Scores the OT Winner in his 1,000th Game!

*Featured photo credit to AP/Chris Carlson)

It’s games and moments like these that make me preach that out of all professional sports, the Gods of Hockey have the BEST scriptwriters on staff. Sure, baseball, football, basketball and soccer have amazing stories that deserve their merit, but there is nothing like hockey history, and this game played between the Los Angeles Kings and Colorado Avalanche gave us all a historical doozy of a future story we will be telling the next generation(s) of Kings’ fans. In a year of personal resurgence and redemption, after years of letdowns, disappointing play and even a heartbreaking betrayal did to him, the 33-year-old Dustin Brown scored the overtime winner in his 1000th career NHL regular season game! And it blew the roof off of the Staples Center.

The game started of course, with Brown’s Stanley Cup winning Teammate, Marian Gaborik getting his 1000th game ceremony after achieving the prestigious milestone in a 4-2 loss to the New York Rangers, back on December 15th, (where Gaborik kept the Kings’ in that game by providing a goal and an assist).

Congratulations “Gabbo” on achieving 1,000 (or really, 1,000 and 3 now) career NHL regular season games!!!

Unlike Gaborik and Brown’s 1,000 career game milestones, the first period was nothing the Kings could be proud of, with the exception of the true Last Jedi, Jonathan Quick, who kept the Kings in the game (as always), but the rest of the team came out flat and lethargic. The Av’s, however, did not and they peppered the Kings with offensive attacks, outshooting them 11 to 5 in that opening period. Usually, the lopsided shot count is due to the Kings’ taking too many penalties, therefore allowing the opposing team opportunities to attack. Sadly, there were NO penalties at all in that period. The Kings were just flat.

Things evened out in the second period with the shot count (10 to 9 for the Av’s), but the Av’s got on the scoreboard first with a goal by Captain (and possible future King???) Gabriel Landeskog with a snipe (after Trevor Lewis was left without a stick after it was snapped in half) at 11:14, shortly after the Kings’ had failed to score on the power-play.

In the 3rd period, the Kings’ fourth line of Torrey Mitchell, Andy Andreoff, and Jonny Brodzinski, worked their butts off by battling along the boards to keep the puck in the offensive zone. Their efforts were a success as Alec Martinez scored his 4th of the season at 10:36 with his shot from the point, (a shot that seemed to flutter through the air and deke everyone out and into the net. Could “A-Mart” possibly be Force-sensitive???), to tie the game 1-1. Mitchell and Andreoff got the assists and Martinez now has 4 points in the last five games.

Which then takes us to the overtime and history. We all know the roller-coaster journey Dustin Brown has been on, from the time he was drafted by then Kings’ general manager, and forever Kings’ legend Dave Taylor, (which is ironic since Taylor was the first Kings’ player ever to reach 1,000 career games, all with the Kings, with Brown now being the second ever! I’m telling you, the Hockey Gods’ scriptwriters deserve some Oscars damn it!), to a wrecking ball of a player that quickly (not Johnny Quickie) earned the respect of his teammates, coaches, and management, (well maybe not Sean Avery‘s but who cares about him).

In time, Brown became the Captain of the team and one of the NHL’s top 3 hitters in the entire league. By the summer of 2012, Brown had become the first ever Captain of the Los Angeles Kings’ to lead the team to a Stanley Cup victory and was in close consideration for the Conn Smythe Trophy for Playoff MVP. By the summer of 2014, he did it again and became the first ever American born player to lead a team to a Stanley Cup victory twice! (Derian Hatcher was the first in 1999 with the Dallas Stars). Then like in any great story told, conflict arrived and things for our hero went south, (not San Diego). The team barely could make it into the playoffs, and when they did, they would fall in the first round. His contract was now too expensive for the salary cap-strapped Kings and stuck out like a sore thumb when his on-ice production fell to disappointing levels. The tension and lack of support Brown received from his head coach and GM only made things worse for his confidence, but even then he never thought the betrayal and embarrassment of them stripping him of the Captaincy would be possible. He was wrong. It was not only possible, it happened, and they did it without even a heads up or a warning. Like thieves in the night, they stripped Dustin Brown, a loyal soldier and leader to the Kings’ cause since he was a rookie, of his pride.

But then Brown put on a LUCHADOR MASK to hide his identity, and became the Kings’ superhero, THE MAKED CRUSADER!!! And as THE MASKED CRUSADER, Brown was able to be the hard-hitting wrecking ball, goal scoring, penalty killing machine we all knew and loved, especially after he saved all those orphans from the evil …

Mario Hicks (Editor-in-Chief of CaliSports News)

Um, Jeff.

Me

Yeah, Chief.

Mario

The um… masked Dustin Brown part actually didn’t happen. That’s what YOU would have written for his story if you were a Hockey God scriptwriter.

Jeff

Oh right! My bad Chief. I got a little carried away there.

Mario

No problem!

Jeff

So um… Chief? What about the time Brown helped land that plane safely in that desert after it was high-jacked by Super Steroid Ninjas?

Mario

Um … no… that um… didn’t happen either.

Jeff

Oh. Oh okay. Thanks, Chief.

Mario

Anytime!

Okay, sorry about that everyone. Let’s backtrack a bit here… where were we? Oh right! Okay, so Brown was stripped of the Captaincy without even a heads up or a warning, only hurting his confidence even further and made him suffer another disappointing season. But the tide had finally turned when the Kings’ organization decided to clean house and have a different coach and GM. A coach, that would believe in Dustin Brown again. With that support and trust in place, and the support and trust from his teammates (which he never lost, including from bestie and current Kings’ Captain Anze Kopitar), Brown is currently in the midst of a career resurgence, and a season of redemption.

44 seconds into the 3 on 3 overtime period, Drew Doughty and Captain “Kopi” created a turnover. Doughty noticed a racing and unmarked Dustin Brown due to the Avalanche deciding to make a line change. Doughty fired the pass perfectly on to the stick of the former Captain, and with a speed, we haven’t seen in years, and two Colorado players trying to catch him, Brown bared down in front of Colorado goalie Semyon Varlamov and wristed the puck into the net for the game winner! And like I said, the Staples Center went berserk! As did Brown’s teammates as they all celebrated his game-winning goal for his 1,000th game! (Thank you Brownie and thank you Hockey Gods!)

The goal was “Brownie’s” 13th goal of the season in only 35 games, which is one goal less then he got all of last season in 80 games! (He only got 11 goals in 82 games in both the 2014-15 and 2015-16 seasons).  The game-winning assists went to Doughty and Kopitar. It was also Brown’s 33rd career game-winning goal, and the 245th of his career, which is one away from tying Wayne Gretzky for 7th overall on the LA Kings’ all-time goals list with 246! Jonathan Quick stood tall and got the victory by making 31 out of 32 saves and the Kings have now won two straight games, with 5 points in the last three, and are back in first place of the Pacific Division with 22 wins and 48 points. The expansion Vegas Golden Knights trail in second place with 46 points, but have three games in hand. This victory is also the Kings’ 10th win after giving up the first goal, which leads the league.

When asked by the LA Kings Insider Jon Rosen, about what he thought about the game where he reached a milestone achievement, humble and honest as always, Brown had this to say;

“The big picture is really nice and probably something for me, a memory, it’s nice. But on a day-to-day, which is the main focus and how you get to 1,000 games, we didn’t play very good. But good teams find a way to win when they maybe shouldn’t. Had a big hole in the third, the fourth line got us a huge goal, and overtime’s overtime nowadays with three-on-three.”

Brown continues;

“That was kind of a crazy overtime, really. They didn’t really get anything at our net, but they had a chance at a couple breakaways. It was really sloppy for three-on-three. I think when their guys tried to get a change in when we had a position, that’s when I found a hole.”

Dustin Brown never makes it about himself. He makes it about the team. His team. The Los Angeles Kings and how he and the team can always do better. Captain or not, Brown is always all in for this team and franchise that we all love so much.

This is what Martinez had to say about Brown after the game;

“I can’t say enough about Brownie. He’s been an unbelievable leader and a huge part of this organization ever since he was drafted when he was 18. He’s been through a lot in this organization and had a lot of ups and downs, but he’s never wavered.”

Coach John Stevens added this about Brown as well;

“It was fitting. Almost poetic justice. It was really, really nice to see him get the winning goal in that situation. The accolades and the compliments you give Brownie, I don’t think you can overdo it.

He also added;

“I think Brownie deserves credit for what’s happened. He came in ready to go. There’s nothing given in this game, it’s earned.”

—

Meanwhile, in a hidden bat cave somewhere underneath the city of St. Louis, Missouri, LA Kings’ legend Dave Taylor watches the highlights of the Kings vs Avalanche game and smiles when he sees Dustin Brown, a player he drafted in the first round back in 2003 when he was the general manager of the Kings, not only play in his 1,000th game, but score the overtime game winner too. Nodding his head in approval, Taylor looks in the mirror and whispers, “Go Kings Go!”… BEFORE PUTTING ON HIS LUCHADOR MASK AND FLYING OFF TO SAVE THE POOR ORPHANS IN THAT PLANE HIGH-JACKED BY THE EVIL SUPER STEROID NINJAS!!!

Well if Brown isn’t allowed to do it, SOMEONE HAS TOO!

GO KINGS GO!!!

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

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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