Anze Kopitar continued his post season heroics for the Los Angeles Kings last night as he scored the overtime winner giving the Kings a 1-0 lead in this Stanley Cup Finals. Last night's game one marked the first cup finals game to be played at the Prudential Center in Newark, the first finals appearance for the Devils since 2003, and the first appearance in the finals for the Kings since 1993.
The first period seemed more of a feeling out process between the two teams. Shots were even at 5 a piece but the Kings scored the only goal, as at the 9:56 mark of the period Colin Fraser scored his first of the playoffs, set up by Jordan Nolan. For Fraser, not only was it his first goal of this playoffs, but it was his first career playoff goal. Not a bad way to get you're first career playoff goal in game one of the Cup Finals I'd say. As for Jordan Nolan, he is the son of former NHL head coach Ted Nolan, so that family is still having a big impact in the NHL. That opening period at the start seemed to be a feeling out process, but after the Fraser goal it seemed as if the Kings would really start to carry the play after that. It was physical start to this game, as it has been for most of this years playoffs.
The 2nd period got underway and again it seemed as if the Kings were still carrying more of the play from the first period. Martin Brodeur had to make some solid stops for the Devils to keep them in this opening game, and he finally got some offensive3 help late in the period. The Devils offense looked flat for about the first half of the hockey game, not getting too many quality scoring chances. But as that 2nd period moved along the Devils seemed to start to chip away a bit at the Kings defense. Finally at the 18:48 mark Anton Volchenkov got the Devils on the board and tied the game. He was set up by Patrik Elias and David Clarkson. It was a somewhat broken play really as Volchenkov took the shot from a tough angle along the side boards and it appeared at first to hit off Elias, who was crashing the net but after the off ice officials took a look at the play it was revealed that Elias never touched the puck and it actually redirected off Kings defenseman Slava Voynov, who was at the side of the net trying to check Elias. So the teams skated off the ice at the end of two tied at two. Shots in the middle period where 9-3 in favor of the Kings.
The 3rd period saw no scoring and no penalties what so ever. Shots in the final period where 8-7 in favor of the Kings, but by far the best chance of the final period went to the Devils and Mark Fayne:
Fayne had a GOLDEN chance to put the Devils in the lead at that moment but he just shoved it wide of the cage. But the shot missed the net. Both Jonathan Quick and Martin Broduer had to play well in this 3rd period to keep the game tied and that's what they did to force overtime.
Overtime hit and both teams look very sloppy, especially with the play in the neutral zone. But it was the Devils who made one crucial mistake in overtime and it cost them. It came on a failed pinch attempt at the Kings blueline and Anze Kopitar cashed in on it at 8:13 of overtime:
The goal gave the Kings the victory in game one. Shots in overtime where 3-2 in favor of LA.The win was the Kings 3rd overtime victory in this years playoffs. The Devils fall to 4-2 in overtime in this years playoffs. Jonathan Quick stopped 16 of 17 Devils shots and his counterpart Martin Broduer snagged 23 of 25 Kings shots.
Going into this series I thought special teams was going to play a factor in this series, and at least in game one it wasn't much of a factor. The Devils went 0 for 2 on the powerplay and the Kings came up empty on their only powerplay. Also going into this contest I thought having a week off between their game five victory over the Coyotes and this game one would have a negative effect on the Kings, but it obviously didn't have any effect at all. Looking at this from a Devils perspective there is slight reason to panic, as there was no real life from the team, no solid offensive pressure from the outset, at least not from what I saw. The team may want to consider trying to shake up the line combinations just a bit for game two to try and find some offenseive spark and consistency but that decision is going to be up to the coaching staff as to what they want to do for the next game. There is a positive spin that can be put on this for the Devils. If you think back to rounds two and three in both cases they lost game one, and in round two against the Flyers they lost game one in overtime as well. Just something to think about heading into game two.
Game Two of the Finals will be Saturday night at 8 p.m. from the Prudential Center in Newark, and the game will be televised on NBC!
No comments:
Post a Comment