Kings In Season Opener Form; Fall To Sharks 5-1

  Welcome back officially to Staples Center, where the LA Kings were in their typical season opening form. Which is to say the scene on the ice wasn’t going their way. It started with so much hope. A new opening video to remind fans that while we’ve been down, adversity makes us stronger. The introduction of the team, now that the official roster is set. In a somewhat head scratcher of a move, McNabb was out and Schultz was in. To our great pleasure both Muzzin and Greene were back after suffering preseason injuries. Dwight King remains on injured reserve after stopping the puck with his foot in the opening frame of the Vegas game this past weekend. The team came out to rapturous applause and the hope of a new season burned through the stadium.

Last night was the goalie matchup fans have been waiting for since the announcement that ex-LA King Martin Jones would be a San Jose Shark. Both goalies posted a strong stand in the preseason, but as we were to learn over the next three hours, only one was to win his team tow points. At first it seemed like that would be Quick, when Shore outwitted a Sharks defenseman and blasted the puck from the right circle past Jones less than two minutes into the game. Clifford got into it on the next faceoff, and put up a hell of a fight that sent both players to the box for five minutes. Lucia and Kopitar had a couple of noteworthy shifts; some nice breakaways and shots at Jones but he stopped them short. Dustin Brown practically killed Logan Couture in the neutral zone in what should have been the hit of the game. About halfway through the first period Jones mishandled the puck and it looked like his own teammate was going to score on him, yet mere seconds later the puck was streaming up the left hand side of the ice and over Quick’s left shoulder into the net. Barclay Goodrow went into the box at 7:49 for slashing, but the resulting play after the power play looked better – sustained zone time for almost three minutes.

It went downhill from there. At 15:46 Andre Andreoff ended up with a delay of game penalty  ( Daryl Sutter and I least favorite penalty) and at 15:52 the Pavelski scored off the faceoff. The Kings went into the second period down 2-1 and with 1:50 of penalty to kill thanks to Erhoff. The game looked like it might make a turn for the better when a Sharks’ stick broke off into Trevor Lewis’s face, who took it and the puck down the ice on a potential shorthanded breakaway, but fizzled once he got to the Sharks zone. The next power play looked a lot like the Kings couldn’t find their feet but the next two minutes they had a good cycle going and kept the puck solidly in the the Sharks zone. As per Kings typical fashion that meant nothing because when the puck eventually made it back into the Kings zone Burns put it into the back of the net. At 7:00 Alec Martinez made his way into the penalty box for holding and the Kings looked like they were losing their composure. Sure enough, Vlassik shoots from the point and the shot deflected off Hertl’s stick, Quick’s pad and into the net. For those keeping score that’s 4-1 Sharks. Vlassik followed up with a penalty that the Kings couldn’t do anything with. Drew Doughty missed a pass at least twice, and it seemed that the Kings just couldn’t get any traction. They couldn’t get any zone time and when they did they couldn’t set up a play. They seemed stuck in the neutral zone and were losing those battles.

Two power plays didn’t help the Kings and the second period closed with only 4 shots on goal. One spectacular sequence from Lucic streaming down the left side culminating in a sick shot from Tyler Toffoli across the ice should have started a comeback if not for Martin Jones robbing him blind. If Kings fans thought the third would bring some kind of relief, less than four minutes into it, the puck came off the end boards and Pavelski capitalized on the chance before any King could clear. 5-1 Sharks. Then came a sequence even experts couldn’t figure out. Greene made a late hit on Goodrow, and ends up fighting Mike Brown. Andreoff gets into it with Goodrow, and we end up with six penalties. Brown with five for fighting and two for roughing. Woodrow and Andreoff both get five for fighting. Green gets 2 for roughing and two for interference. Yet somehow only one Shark ended up in the box and Shore sat in the box with Greene and Andreoff for four minutes. You do the math because I did and it still doesn’t make sense.

A few more penalties closed out the rest of the game, the only notable one included Couture on a shorthanded breakaway blowing it and ending up on Quick. Erhoff pummeled the guy for good measure and the Kings ended up with a five on three for 90 seconds at 16:30 in the third. And yet. They still couldn’t convert anything. It seemed to irritate Milian Lucic more than anyone, because when Couture came out of the box and made a big hit on Lucic, he skated straight to Couture away from the play and sent him into the Sharks bench. He received a match penalty and will likely be under review by tomorrow. Not the way the Kings wanted to end the game. Not the way the Kings wanted to start the season. It was an undisciplined, penalty ridden game full of mistakes that we hope not to see come Friday.