The LA Kings had debuted ten players to the playoffs by the time the puck dropped for their Friday evening contest at home versus the Oilers. Before the game was over, “make that eleven” was the lament. Why? Because Jonathan Quick got yanked after allowing four...
After one period of play on Wednesday night, it appeared that the LA Kings might just reprise their victory of Game 1 and go home to Cali on Friday night with a 2-0 series lead. This on the strength of two near goals early and hard physical play throughout ...
The first night of the NHL playoffs a la 2022 was marked with high-scoring knockout games. 5-0, 5-1, 4-0. If you could have picked which one would the the mighty Oilers versus the much-injured Kings, you would have taken the first of those. Edmonton's favor. Well,...
What would you do if you made enough money to retire in your mid-30s? Most people successful enough to do that don’t just golf. They’re too competitive for a life of leisure. If they’ve built one business, they build another one. With athletes, it’s a little bit...
The LA Kings and Anaheim Ducks finished their “Freeway Faceoff” series on Saturday night with the Kings playing to solidify their likely playoff berth and the Ducks trying to hold on and end the season respectably. Mostly, the Anaheim effort was worthy, though they...
The full line from which I’ve excerpted my title is, “Unresting death, a whole day nearer now,” from a Philip Larkin poem (“Aubade”), and I cite it as a reminder: we’ve lost Guy Lafleur, at 70 too young to go. And his death portends our own, though mostly we don’t...
Jonathan Quick was back in net Thursday as the Kings extended their efforts to make the playoffs in the Western Conference. This on the heels of an amazing performance in their last game, Tuesday versus Anaheim. It was a game that I described as featuring perhaps...
The LA Kings needed their game in Anaheim Tuesday night. Desperately. Especially since the potential spot-stealer of their playoff berth, Vegas, had lost their game on Monday versus, of all teams, the non-playoff New Jersey Devils. Thus the Kings entered Tuesday’s...
Jonathan Quick found himself starting in the LA Kings’ net for the third game in a row on Saturday night, despite having been pulled against Colorado in a 9-3 loss on Wednesday. The Kings had no room for fooling around, as they came into the game sitting third in the...
The Anaheim Ducks have bent to the curve on the incident on Friday night when Jay Beagle beat the stuffing out of Troy Terry after Trevor Zegras started a scrum by poking at the goalie’s pad when he covered a puck with Anaheim ahead by a handful of goals. Witness the...
A Stanley Cup and two Olympic gold medals. World Junior Gold. Over 1000 points and 1150 games. The captaincy of a team that has looked to him for leadership since 2010. Being picked 19th overall in the 2003 amateur draft. With these attributes, there’s no doubt Ryan...
Of late, the LA Kings have just kept winning. With a victory on Monday night versus Calgary, in fact, they would be but a point behind the Flames for the Division lead. They would do so only if they could overcome an early deficit. Calgary scored with just ten seconds...
The Anaheim Ducks kicked some a$$ on Friday night, winning 5-0 in Colorado. They also got their a$$es kicked in a late (approx. five minutes left) scrum where Trevor Zegras took a bad cross check and Troy Terry came in in his defense and got whipped by Jay Beagle. Why...
On the night when Cam Fowler played his 800th game, all with the Ducks, and Trevor Zegras was immortalized in bobblehead form, it might have been hoped that the Anaheim squad could muster a spirited effort. That they did, but the results did not follow, though...
You’ll read the box score and say it simply—“Yeah, the Ducks lost. Dallas is better.” Dallas IS better, but that’s not the story of their game with Anaheim in California on Tuesday night. Sure, it was a 3-2 game, but far more exciting than that. Not that it had ...
Back in 1986, the New York Islanders grabbed a centerman in the 5th round. He was the 104th pick in the draft. Few probably thought he’d be in the NHL for 1000 games. And Todd McLellan wasn’t. His playing career, in fact, lasted just five games. He has a perfect...
Sam Carrick gets a pair--of goals, Wednesday, to go along with his pair of fights on Monday night. He featured in many plays throughout the night. But this game was also about what the Ducks got, and didn't get, as of Monday 12pm local time, trade deadline...
If you wander down the right hallway in Honda Center, home of the Ducks, sometime soon, you might see a man looking suspiciously like the General Manager pushing hard on a cupboard door, trying to close it. Pat Verbeek is still not likely to be able to shut in...
You can’t beat the Ducks for jargon. A while ago, I wrote an article about coach Dallas Eakins called something like, “Less Psychobabble, More Hockey” in response to the constant stream of pop psychological (nonsense) that extruded itself from his mouth. Then the...
Every once in a while, an NHL defenseman throws a puck right into the front of his own net, and watchers say to themselves, “Wow. They teach you not to do that in Pee Wee.” Well, there’s an excuse for you! But what if your team’s D looks so inexperienced as to...
Funny coincidence: The LA Kings hosted South Asian Heritage Night with Florida in town Sunday evening. Two nights before, I had given a talk to students at Gujarat National Law University on the topic of “Kinetic Motion as Cultural Expression: The Case for Canadian...
Not enough, and not in time. Said another way: despite coming back from 3-1 down after the LA Kings scored a shorthanded goal Thursday night, the San Jose Sharks piled up two points but are still doing too little, too late. The game was notable for the way LA, as...
The Anaheim Ducks should have come storming out of the gate on Sunday afternoon at 5pm for their game with the Sharks. San Jose had lost 8-0 at home the night before. The Ducks need all the points they can get, especially against teams in their own division. They...
Well, so much for my fancy theories. I thought I was speaking the truth when I said that the Kings and Ducks would show their true levels when playing common opponents this week. And I was right in the first instance—the Ducks lost to the Islanders, but the ...
This week was supposed to show hockey fans where the two SoCal teams were heading, and most people figured that that was in different directions. The Kings and the Ducks play two common opponents this week: the New York Islanders and Boston. The Kings were supposed to...
Down the Freeway went the Kings on Friday night to play the Anaheim Ducks. The Kings came in riding a three-game win streak, the Ducks with two wins against Divisional opponents. Each would use their old hand pro goalie—John Gibson and Jonathan Quick.This would...
This is a very important week in the West. If that’s true, then it’s a very, very important week in the Pacific. Probably that’s news to a lot of fans in the East, because they are concerned with the ever-long questions: Will the Leafs start to get better...
Tampa Bay needed but four defensemen on Tuesday night to stifle the LA Kings and win 6-4. Six weren’t enough to defeat the Ducks on Friday, though they once again let in just four goals (plus an empty netter). The game featured the return of Corey Perry to...
You wouldn’t think you were watching the NHL’s premier offensive powerhouse observing the Colorado Avalanche playing in Southern California on Wednesday and Thursday nights. On Wednesday, it was a two-goal performance, including on empty-netter. On Thursday up the...
Colorado came storming out of the gate versus Anaheim in SoCal on Wednesday, only to see the first period of their game yield no goals for either side. It was a surprising result, on two counts. On the one hand, Colorado was scary early, with shots and chances from...
