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Tail of Two Teams
The two Southern California hockey teams open the season at
the level of pre-season expectations.
(LOS ANGELES) -- The Los Angeles Kings and the Anaheim
Ducks met for the second time on Sunday, with both teams
in a position where most experts thought they would be.
The Ducks, our pick to win it all, entered the game
undefeated in regulation (they lost twice in shootouts
to Dallas Stars and the New York Islanders) and have
been playing leapfrog with Dallas and San Jose Sharks
for first place in the Pacific Division. They left the
game as the only remaining team in the league by virtue
of a 3-2 shootout win at Staples Center. |
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Anaheim's played well, they've played smart and yet head coach
Randy Carlyle thinks they're still a work in progress. He's
still waiting for dynamic duo of Teemu Selanne and Andy
McDonald to join the band, but has to be pleased that Corey
Perry and Chris Kunitz have done their best to avoid the
dreaded "sophomore jinx."
Carlyle has settled on Jean Sebastian Giguere as the No.1
goaltender for his squad; he abruptly yanked Ilya Bryzgalov in
the shootout loss to Dallas last week saying.
"I don't like short-side goals, and they had two go in on the
short side," he said. "I felt we were flat as a group, and I
thought it would help our composure."
Young Mr. Bryzgalov has yet to come off the pine since.
The vibe that one gets watching the Ducks play is that they
never panic, a trait borne from their captain, Scott
Niedermayer.
The 33-year-old defenseman plays with both understated flair
and exceptional decision making; he never appears to be out of
position defensively and on the rare occasion that he is
beaten, his exceptional speed gets him back in the play to
fend of the opposition's charge. Because the Ducks don't
possess proven offensive depth (the highest amount of goals
they’ve scored in a game is four), they won't pummel you into
submission, preferring to smother the offensive life out of
the team.
They've come to realize the amount of talent they possess as
Selanne notes: "We haven't played our best over the last
couple of games yet we've still won. While that's a sign of a
good team we know we can play a lot better."
As for the prime time player they got over the summer, Chris
Pronger still looks to be getting settled in by the beach but
with the talent on this team, they can wait a few more weeks
for him to be his old nasty self. He may be getting into the
swing of things after burying the Kings' Sean Avery midway
through the teams' Sunday matinee.
As for their cousins to the north, the Kings have proven a
couple of things early on: 1) GM Dean Lombardi already earned
his green this season by stealing stud defenseman Jack Johnson
from Carolina, 2) Lombardi also made the right choice behind
the bench in Marc Crawford, 3) they're better than Phoenix.
Other than that, the team is a significant work in progress.
Their biggest deficiency is that they lack finishers on
offense. They've already had a four game streak of scoring
just one goal; it doesn't help when veterans like Craig Conroy
(there's rumors about him dealt to Atlanta already), Rob Blake
($6 million has gotten you one point so far, KingsNation) and
Alexander Frolov (who oddly refuses to shoot OR hit anyone)
have been invisible.
To further complicate matters, there now appears to be a
goaltender competition; the newly installed Dan Cloutier,
Crawford's man in Vancouver, has been bad, allowing Mathieu
Garon to emerge from the backup shadow. Garon shut down a bad
Phoenix team and that earned him the start against the Ducks.
Though they might tell you otherwise, management didn't think
it would spin out that way. Crawford has to be careful not to
bury the emotional Cloutier too early in the season as he
could lose him mentally for the season.
There is a bright side to the Kings' story; you just have to
look REAL hard and probably with rose colored glasses. Miracle
of miracles, no one on the active roster has been injured yet;
in past years they would have had 100 man games lost due to
injury already.
Anze Kopitar is a star; he has all the tools to be a major
player through the next century. He has great smarts and
presence go along with massive skills. Patrick O’Sullivan is a
determined player whose opportunistic style has gained favor
with Crawford. And well, that's about it.
The team is certainly not playoff caliber, but Lombardi is
slowly putting the parts together to build a team craven in
his hockey image.
Duck Calls
Random thoughts on the shootout from the Anaheim side...
Coach Randy Carlyle: "I like it much better when we win."
Captain Scott Niedermayer, commenting on if his calm demeanor
gets juiced: "For sure. It's really excited for the game to
come down to one goal or one save. I like it."
Teemu Selanne: "It gets my heart pounding."
Dennis
Bernstein, the man behind SCORE! Media, is a columnist for
TheFourthPeriod.com and the Los Angeles Correspondent for The
Fourth Period Magazine.
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