When the Daily News’ Rich Hammond interviewed Dean Lombardi before this season started, Hammond asked him about any collective expectations of any particular King. His answer then now seems clairvoyant. Lombardi gave the following answer:
“I want to see where those kids from last year are. They all have to get better. We've got some depth, in terms of youth, in the system, and a lot of those kids are going to have to go to Manchester. But as the team gets younger, those guys -- Brown, Cammalleri, now Kopitar with a year's experience, Frolov -- these guys all have to go to another level. Its one thing to say, ``Hey, these kids had pretty good years last year,'' but we were the third-worst team in the league. At some point, those kids have to take responsibility for winning.”
The full article can be read here:
http://www.insidesocal.com/kings/2007/08/
There are so many different ways Wednesday’s Sharks’ game could have gone with the Kings’ two (2) top scorers out of the line-up. If you look at the first 11:50 of the first period, there is probably a litany fans thinking this would be like watching Bill Murray’s “Ground Hog Day”. Another game another loss, right? This time the results were thankfully different.
No shooting, running around, seemingly the Sharks’ owned the Kings at first. Here are some of the ugly stats of the first period:
• Everyone but Armstrong were losing face-offs by a wide margin (Handzus, Kopitar and Zeiler)
• Brown had 3 hits but he matched that with 2 give-aways.
• No shots the first 11:50
LaBarbera did what every team can only hope their netminder does, kept the guys in the game until they found their collective game. Sure, a shut-out period might be more satisfying, but with San Jose’s pressure, to come out of that with only 1 goal down was impressive.
The reason this team is harder to reconcile and blame keeps shifting is because in past years blaming goaltending pretty much gave the skaters a full pass. With strength between the pipes, now looking for shortcomings are harder to pin point. This is actually the best news of the season so far.
The forwards and the defense now must step up and be held accountable. Period. I get and have read nearly everywhere that many question Crawford and want to blame the team’s shortcomings solely on coaching. For what this is worth, Crawford never completely instilled any confidence in me when he got here or since.
That being said, if current issues are put at Crawford’s feet ALONE, then the players get another pass and this team may never make the first required big step forward. Stability is key. With 50% turnover on this and the AHL level, if a coaching change were made, that would set the team backwards. It just would.
The Kings’ individually need to be assessed, charged and required to look in the mirror for accountability, not find a new scapegoat. The latter is emotionally satisfying. The former is how the Kings get closer to credibility.
Watching the play alone, I never would have guessed that at the end of the first period that the official shot differential was Kings 8 and Sharks 10.
This is precisely why some statistics alone can be so deceiving. Once Willsie got the team’s first shot on goal, there was a serious momentum change that proceeded for the next 18 minutes of play through most of the second.
In the second,
sans their two best players, Los Angeles showed that Lombardi may now be seeing the kids taking responsibility for winning. Brown and O’Sullivan began to take control of this game and the rest of the Kings followed.
Isn’t it Hockey 101 to keep playing until a whistle is blown? Zeiler’s penalty could have taken away the team’s new momentum by giving up another power play goal. Considering the talent on San Jose’s power play, and the lack of success on the Kings’ penalty kill, that was the most predictable outcome. Here, too, not even close.
Brown makes a key move in the defensive zone, takes off on a short-handed breakaway. The Sharks intelligently hook Brown but not before he gets a shot on goal. With Nabakov down, and no one other than Kopitar moving on my television, Kopitar scores on the rebound!! That was both a confidence builder and a game changing moment.
In the second, O’Sullivan got in on the action and scored a pretty goal of his own. From the 2nd period, O’Sullivan and Brown took over and I submit, took responsibility for winning this game.
They each had a whopping six (6) shots on goal. O’Sullivan matched that with 3 missed shots, 3 blocked shots and his first successful shoot-out goal to boot! Brown matched his offensive shots with 7 blocked shots, a take-away and a lot of redemption from his 2 first period give-aways.
In the third period, the play far more evened out. The Sharks’ penalty kill tapes should be duplicated and made required viewing for every team. San Jose needed that badly considering the number of times they went to the box in the third.
With the dominance of San Jose on the PK, things could have turned out quite differently. I will say that I see and have read the harsh glare being directed at San Jose while they search for answers. I don’t know enough about the Sharks to come to any credible conclusions.
I will say this, something is wrong there when Nabakov has played every game. Considering the Sharks were predicted to be the most Cup worthy in pre-season predictions, wearing out their goaltender in the first 1/4 of the season sure seems like the odd way to go.
The Toronto picks are going to be less than satisfying to the Sharks’ players/organization if the real cost is not having a well rested netminder come playoff time. Wilson recently stated that he “had no plan” as to goaltending. That quote might scare me more than the questions and blame being asked of what the issues are in San Jose. The precise quote is:
“When will Sharks Coach Ron Wilson finally give goalie Evgeni Nabokov a night off?
"If you're asking for a plan," Wilson said Monday, "there is no plan."
Nabakov has the distinction of being the only netminder in the league who has played every game. The full article on this and the Sharks’ post game article can be read here:
http://www.mercurynews.com/sharksheadlines/ci_7569089
http://www.mercurynews.com/sharks/ci_7588002
Again, the game could have ended differently when the Sharks came back to tie the game. The play in the third was far more even between the teams aside from the Sharks’ lack of discipline.
Instead, the game required more than 60 minutes to decide. Overtime provided no more help. In the category of something to build on, every Kings’ shooter scored in the shoot-out without Cammalleri or Frolov.
Here, too, the young stars made the win happen. O’Sullivan scored for the first time in the shoot-out and rightly earned the #1 Star of the Game. Kopitar followed and Brown sealed the deal in one of his most complete games ever in a Kings’ uniform.
I get that no game alone defines a season. This isn’t news to those walking around in disbelief to what the Kings’ played like after their historic “Royal Rebound”. I submit that this might be the more likely game to help Los Angeles turn a corner.
This is the game the Kings should have lost and didn’t. Two of the teams youngest stars wouldn’t allow it and much maligned players Handzus and Stuart helped make it happen too. This was a team win and one of the first glimpses of players standing up for each other and playing as a unit. This just may be when 20 guys became 1 team.
Carla Muller
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