Kings/Panthers Game Sponsored by Oprah: All of the Goals

The Kings took heartbreak to heart and made tonights game one of the most entertaining all year. After one of the other most entertaining games of the season (hello Colorado, you may have literally been freezing but you were an absolute blast!) and a couple of just depressing trades (Toffoli, Martinez, I’ll be in mourning for you for a long time, Vegas does *not* deserve you Jazz Hands!), the Kings came to play. And fight a little. And make records! With what felt like half of Ontario making their case to be on the Kings opening night roster next season (don’t count how many places are now vacant, you’ll just cry), Gabe Vilardi finally made his NHL debut and his case for why he should, less than 90 seconds into the game. In true Luc Robitaille style, he scored on his first shot of his first shift, setting a record for fastest debut – only 10 seconds! He has a great shot and showed quite a bit of skill the whole game. Plus the smile on his face was priceless. (He said he only got 2 hours of sleep last night, anticipating his long awaited debut.) In true Kings fashion it only took about 5 minutes to give up the equalizer, and the next goal 1:40 later. It wasn’t even that the Kings were playing badly. As with most games this season they’ve had everything going for them (hits aside tonight, they were getting smashed quite unproportionately). They looked tight. They looked refreshed. And excited to play. But after the second goal that kind of fell by the wayside. They had a penalty kill that it took me almost 90 seconds to realize they were on. Their power play, on the other hand, that I noticed almost instantly, as Drew Doughty tied it up with a fast slapshot from the point. But he didn’t seem thrilled by it; he seemed off all night actually. Trevor Lewis, (the next on the trading block if you listen to some sources) got crosschecked to the face and I for one would have thoroughly enjoyed to see what would have happened if the ref hadn’t held him back from the retaliation he clearly wanted. He would have to settle for a power play, one split between the first and second period, and one that ended early as the buzzer for the first period sounded, and Walker took a tripping penalty to prevent a last second Panthers goal.

Said penalty might have actually saved a goal come the second, if Kempe hadn’t taken a tripping penalty with 25 seconds left. If it was a deserved penalty it was unclear; Huberdeau lost his edge of his skate as Kempe’s stick was nearby. And it wasn’t even the 5-on-3 that put the Panthers up again, it was with 17 seconds left in Kempe’s. Lots of back and forth scoring wise considering there were only 12 shots for the Panthers and 3 goals to speak of, and 2 goals on the Kings 16 shots. The Kings did do some things better than usual though – their faceoff percentage ended up at 65.1%, with huge kudos to Vilardi, who won 13 of 16 and went 4 for 4 in the d-zone. (Dare I say we’ve found our Jarret Stoll replacement? Lori Hultin would like to think so!) It helped their possession numbers immensely, though their 21 giveaways had a bit to do with their 3-2 score. It took 22 shots for the Kings to get their third goal; Thomas Moore was only the second native Californian to score for the Kings at Staples Center. He tipped Doughty’s shot and had much more enthusiasm for his goal than Drew did. This was halfway through the second, and after several more minutes it was clear this was an a-typical Kings second period. It wasn’t a total black hole. In fact, by the end of it they’d scored even more goals! (Well, one more. But still. Two whole goals in the second!) Martin Frk, only player in NHL history to have no vowels in his last name and current holder of the fastest shot record (109.2 MPH) scored his 5th of the season, almost immediately followed by Doughty taking a penalty to close the period (see what I mean? Doughty was off. And he didn’t look thrilled about it.)

Kempe and Yandle joined Doughty in the penalty box to start the third; a roughing scuffle at the end of the second secured their place, but I can’t even blame any of them for Hoffman’s tying goal 36 seconds in. It was a stunning goal. Some more mindless skating, noticing that Vilardi is the answer to everything, then a Kings power play with 9 minutes left. Hutton’s go ahead goal wasn’t technically on the power play, but right after so close enough. “I thought our guys need to have fun,” coach McLellan said. “The fans that come to the rink have to be entertained and goals are entertainment. I think there’s nights where they probably say, ‘well, the coach is a lunatic, he wants them to check their way to a win.’ But we have to do what we have to do to win, and a lot of night’s it’s checking. Tonight we checked and found ways to score goals, so I’m happy for our guys. Would we like to tighten up the defensive part of it? A complete giveaway on the first one – we can fix that. Hoffman bats it out of the air – very reminiscent to the Shea Weber goal early in the year. I think we can repair that. And in that case then we’re giving up two and we only need three. But that’s the direction we’re going, and we want to be a fun team to watch. We want the players to have fun when they’re playing – and a lot of that is offense – but we’ve got to play on both sides of the puck and we’re learning to do that right now.” Apologies for the lack of detail on the third – a fight broke out a section over that lasted the 5-10 minutes of the game and required actual police and ice for crowd control. So, entertainment all around!