Kings Fans: Tic Tac Toe Put Your Hands in the Air

Anze Kopitar is back! If that’s not the perfect thing to be thankful for the day before Thanksgiving I don’t know what is. That 70’s Line maybe. And another Kings win, that’s great too. As Daryl Sutter said: tic tac toe put your hands in the air.

The second was a relative snooze fest. The best play came with literally 15 seconds remaining when Kyle Clifford had an entirely open net (Halak had misplayed the puck and was behind the net) but somehow slipped instead, leading to a loud groan instead of a loud cheer. The third opened with a strong Islanders push that lead, inevitably, to a tied game at 4:27. It was an obvious situation – mad scramble at the net, Budaj goes down but can’t cover, the Kings can’t clear, and the puck ends up in the back of the net. For the next 10 minutes it looked like the Kings were going to lose their hard-earned lead. The puck spent much more time in the Kings zone than it did in the Islanders. Even a Kings power play at 6:23 didn’t do much to keep the puck around Halak. The damn broke however around the time of the Kings second power play, with 4:56 remaining. Literally 1 second after that power play expired the Kings scored their second of the evening, so credit the power play for setting it up, even if it isn’t officially a power play goal. Derek Forbert took the shot, a patient play waiting for the proper opening, tipped in by first Lewis then Dwight King (who with two goals in 25 seconds seemed determined to prove me wrong about putting him on a line with Kopitar. Though I wouldn’t say standing by the net was the play of the evening, the goal was all Forbert.) It was his 100th point. 25 seconds later, Drew Doughty begins the play that led to King’s second of the evening, carrying the puck into the Islanders zone and slapping it towards Halak. It rebounded behind the net where it was picked up by Trevor Lewis, handled back around to the front of the net and then into the net by King. Not content to have 2 goals in 25 seconds, an empty net goal from Jake Muzzin would give the Kings 3 in 44 seconds. A fourth followed 17 seconds later, but it was an Islanders goal, who also seemed to feed off the chaos. The next 1:42 seemed almost uneventful in comparison, as announcer Dave Joseph barely had time to announce the four goals before the game came to a close.

Certainly an entertaining final 5 minutes to lead into Thanksgiving! From everyone here at CaliSportsNews, have a great one! There are plenty of things to be thankful for, Kings fans.