Scott Niedermayer, Anaheim’s future Hall of Fame defenseman, started his NHL career during the 1991-92 season, when Drew Doughty was 2 years old. How’s that for some perspective? The defensemen will be on opposite sides tonight, but they will be on the same side, for Canada, next week when the Olympic hockey tournament starts.

When league followers talk about the player Doughty might become some day, Niedermayer’s name is often mentioned. Here’s what Niedermayer said this morning, when asked for his impressions of Doughty’s play this season…

NIEDERMAYER: “I think the big thing is just that he’s playing with a lot of confidence. That goes a long way for anybody, whether you’re a second-year guy or a 15-year guy. When you’re playing with confidence and you feel like what you’re going to do is going to work, good things are going to happen when you’re at your best. Right now, that’s how that whole team is, but he’s playing with a lot of confidence right now.”

Ryan Miller got a lot of attention for his flashy Team USA helmet. I got a chance to see Jonathan Quick’s Olympic helmet and ask him about the story behind it, which involves a childhood friend. You can read the story by clicking below, and also see part of the helmet. I’m hoping there are other pictures I can post that give a more complete look at the helmet…

Mask of Honor

Davis Drewiske will be back in the Kings’ lineup tonight for the first time since he injured his shoulder in a Jan. 4 game against San Jose. Terry Murray often talks about the Ducks’ big bodies, and the Kings’ need for defensemen and the goalie to be ready for a physical game in front of the net. No doubt, Murray hopes that Drewiske, at 6-foot-2, 222 pounds, can help the Kings in that area. Here’s what Drewiske said about his return, followed by Murray’s thoughts…

DREWISKE: “I’m excited to get back in. I’ll just try to do my part. We’ve been on a good roll here, so I just have to keep it simple and take care of our own end, and hopefully we can keep winning.”

Continue reading ‘Drewiske’s return’ »

Davis Drewiske will return to the Kings’ lineup tonight, in place of Peter Harrold, as Jack Johnson’s partner. That leaves the Kings with the lineup they practiced with yesterday, basically…

Smyth-Kopitar-Brown
Richardson-Stoll-Simmonds
Frolov-Handzus-Parse
Ivanans-Moller-Segal

Scuderi-Doughty
Johnson-Drewiske
O’Donnell-Greene

It was an optional skate this morning, and Jonathan Quick took the option to rest, but he will start tonight. More from the skate to come…

The Kings sniffed around Ilya Kovalchuk. You knew it, I knew it, everyone in the NHL knew it, even if the folks in the Kings’ locker room did their best to ignore it, for fear of it becoming a distraction. Given that the Kings are 2-0 since Kovalchuk got traded to New Jersey, there doesn’t appear to be any disappointment. If anything, from what I’ve heard, there’s excitement that this team, intact, will be able to try to finish what he started.

Asked about the non-trade today, Murray echoed those sentiments and gave some interesting insight in terms of the process of building the Kings…

MURRAY: “You go over the history of teams in the league, and there’s not really a wrong way or a right way. Nobody is smarter than anybody else, when it comes to building teams. It’s just our way of doing things. It’s Dean’s way of doing things. This is the process that we talked about in the interview I had when the job opened up. This is how we planned about going about business. He’s staying with his decision, and everybody in the organization is on board with that, meaning ownership, obviously the management people upstairs and the coaching staff.

Continue reading ‘Sticking with the plan’ »

Before the season, I looked at two areas as being the most important in terms of whether the Kings would have success this season. One was goaltending, and after a somewhat wobbly start, Jonathan Quick has been very strong. The other was secondary scoring. How is that working out? Well, the Kings already have eight players with 10 or more goals this season. In all of last season, they only had six 10-plus goal scorers.

It seemed to me that the Kings, right now, are at their apex in terms of balanced scoring. At the start of the season, the Kopitar-Smyth-Williams line carried the team. Then, when Smyth got hurt and Kopitar slumped, the second and third lines picked it up. Now, it seems as though the Kings, most nights, are a three-line threat. I asked Kopitar if that was basically correct…

KOPITAR: “I think it’s a fair assessment. Obviously with the start that me, Smytty and Willy had, we were hot. Other guys were contributing too, but we were maybe getting all the goals and the fame, but the guys were playing hard. We can’t forget that for success, especially with this team, we need all the guys on board. Then, when I hit that slump there, we were still winning games. Simmer stepped up big time, throughout that stretch. I think Stolly had some really big goals too, so I think it just shows how deep we are. And that’s what you need, for being consistent and consistently winning games.”

Continue reading ‘Multiple threats’ »

Jonathan Quick got in his first practice with his Team USA goalie pads and blocker, and Jack Johnson also practiced with his USA gloves. The presumption has been that Quick is considered Team USA’s third goalie, behind Ryan Miller and Tim Thomas, and that Quick would be a longshot to get into an Olympic game. Given the way Quick has played recently, though, it’s not crazy to think that Quick might get a look. Murray endorsed the idea today…

MURRAY: “Quick has played a lot of games. I think he’s the winningest goaltender in the National Hockey League right now. If we’re looking at the selections of players to all the different teams, the resume you bring, the record you bring, is how you are selected. To me, when I look at Jonathan Quick and I see what he has done in this part of the season. If there is an opportunity for him to play, I think he should play. There would be no hesitation in my mind, based on performance to date.”

In the next couple days, I’ll have a story on Quick’s new Olympic mask and the story behind it.

As expected, today was called a “therapy” day for Dustin Brown and Matt Greene. Terry Murray said both guys will play tomorrow. Davis Drewiske did skate today, but when will he play? Murray didn’t commit to Drewiske’s status for tomorrow’s game, either way, but said Drewiske is under consideration.

MURRAY: “I’ve got to think about what I’m going to do, as far as the lineup. His work on the ice now is good. He’s looking like he’s really close. I think it comes down to my decision. `Is he game ready?’ If he is, I can make the decision and get him in. I’ll think about that throughout the day today.”

I took the opportunity to ask Murray about Justin Williams, and how visible he is around the team these days…

MURRAY: “He comes in here in the mornings and then goes over to the swimming pool. He’s progressing. He’s getting better. I think it’s going to be within the next several days that he’s going to be able to start walking.”

Murray said Williams is still on crutches at this point.

Even a franchise-record winning streak doesn’t make a team immune to changes, if a coach feels changes are necessary. Down 3-0 after one period yesterday, Terry Murray moved guys around. He basically flipped sets of wingers up top, with Ryan Smyth and Dustin Brown joining Anze Kopitar, and Brad Richardson and Wayne Simmonds joining Jarret Stoll. Scott Parse moved up to the third line with Alexander Frolov and Michal Handzus.

Thus, it seems, ended the surprisingly successful experiment of putting Richardson and Simmonds on the first line. Born from desperation, it worked quite well for a while, and coincided with Kopitar’s return to being a top-level scorer. In the meantime, though, Smyth has raised his level of play considerably, and there’s a strong recent history of Smyth and Kopitar playing well together. Here’s what Murray and Kopitar said today about the changes among the top six forwards, starting with whether Murray was looking for the right opportunity to reunite Smyth and Kopitar.

MURRAY: “I’m not looking for the opportunity, but I’m aware that if I need to make a change again, I’ll do that. The reason that Richardson and Simmonds got put on that line was because of the way they were playing. Details, hard, heavy, gritty, and still at a pretty significant skill level. Sometimes when you play and you’re viewed as the number one line, you start to think, `Well, I better bring my skill up to the next level.’ As a result, the other side of your game, that we’re talking about here, you start to pay a price for us. Really, their foundation is the reason they got there.

Continue reading ‘Movable parts’ »

Dustin Brown and Matt Greene get today off from practice, likely as “therapy days.” Teddy Purell is skating where Brown did at the end of yesterday’s game, so presumably the Kings are looking at lines of:

Smyth-Kopitar-Brown
Richardson-Stoll-Simmonds
Frolov-Handzus-Parse
Ivanans/Moller/Segal/Purcell

Jonthan Quick is practicing today with his red and blue Team USA pads and gloves. More to come after practice…

– The Kings have now won a franchise record nine consecutive games. The Kings are 11-1-0 in their last 12 games.

– The team record for most consecutive games with at least one point is 11 (9-0-2), set in 1973-74.

– The Kings now have 75 points this season. The only other Kings club to have more points after 58 games was the 1974-75 team (79 points). The 2009-10 team is the fastest Kings club to reach 36 wins.

Continue reading ‘Postgame notes (Feb. 6)’ »

First, my sincere thanks to everyone who has taken the time to express sympathy, today and throughout recent weeks. I’ve had family members and family friends tell me about reading the comments there, and how impressed they are that people share such emotions. It really does mean a lot, so thank you very much.

Going forward now, the focus is on the Kings’ record winning streak. I’ve pulled together some postgame quotes, as offered by the Kings — Murray, Handzus, Brown, Babcock, Lidstrom, Zetterberg) and I’ll pull together the postgame notes soon.

TERRY MURRAY

(on the game…)
MURRAY: “We were not executing in the right way. We started fine, but then when it came to the detailed part of the game, we had too many breakdowns, like the first Zetterberg goal. That pass goes through three people, and that’s just not being alert to an assignment. Same on the four-on-four faceoff. We have two guys going to the defenseman up at the blue line and again that’s being alert and executing in the right way, but as mentioned, you get nine lives and you come back and that’s a hard team to come back against. It’s the second time within a couple weeks now that we’ve done it and it shows a lot of character.”

(on second-period changes…)
MURRAY: “Had to make some changes on the line combinations going into the second period, and I thought Parse stepped up to the Handzus line and made a big play on the goal that we scored early in the second period. Guys just stepped in. They’ve shown to be able to do that throughout the course of the year, and there was a need for it today. Balanced scoring, defense starting to get more of the pucks through/ I thought at the start of the game we were hesitant, not shooting, hitting the legs, and as the game went on we started to get more pucks to the net and better traffic at the net.”

Continue reading ‘Postgame quotes (Feb. 6)’ »

For those who don’t know — and many have sent very kind messages and comments — my family suffered a major loss last month, and I’ll be away from work today for a memorial service. Unfortunately, that means being away from a big game today, but I’ll be back afterward to pass along some notes and quotes, etc. Thanks for your understanding today…

For those who need it, here’s a NHL.com preview of today’s game…

Kings-Detroit preview

This falls under the category of “obvious,” but it’s still worth pointing out. The level of fun around the Kings, whether it’s on the ice in practice or in the locker room after practice, has increased significantly this season. There’s more joking around, more chatter, more guys hanging around the facility, and just a general better feeling.

Clearly, winning breeds that type of an attitude, but I wondered how it must feel to a guy such as Drew Doughty, whose rookie season had to be miserable in terms of wins and losses, but now is able to enjoy some fun and success in the NHL…

DOUGHTY: “Coming to the rink every day is a lot more fun than it was last year. Last year, you would come in here and everyone was a little quiet. You didn’t want to say too much, because we were losing and obviously we were down and not having fun losing. But coming in here every day, it’s fun. we’re loud, having fun in the locker room and the music is blaring. When you’re having fun at the rink, you’re going to perform a lot better on the ice, and the way it’s going right now is pretty awesome.”

Continue reading ‘Good times all around’ »

As noted earlier, Peter Harrold practiced as a defenseman today, and after practice, Terry Murray indicated that changes would be coming to the Kings’ lineup tomorrow, but said that Davis Drewiske would not be returning to the lineup…

MURRAY: “I’ve got to make some changes, for sure. I’m not really sure what I’m going to do yet, but I’ve got to change a couple things around.”

I specifically asked Murray about Drewiske, and whether he had any physical concerns, coming off the shoulder injury…

MURRAY: “No, he’s not in (tomorrow). He’s close. He’s really close. We’re just trying to get him game-ready. As far as his rehab is concerned, it has gone along pretty well, but we just need to get him, in our minds, ready to step in and play at the level of game that we’re playing at.”

I’ve had readers ask, recently, about players’ thoughts about trades/trade rumors. My response has been that, during the heart of a playoff race, I think players pay attention to them far less than fans do. But I thought it would be interesting to ask Wayne Simmonds about it, not only because the Kovalchuk trade just went down but because his name was floated, and there seemed to be near-unanimous agreement that the Kings shouldn’t trade him. I asked Simmonds if he was aware that the vast majority of fans were adamant that he not be included in a trade…

SIMMONDS: “It’s good for my confidence, to hear that, to hear what the fans are saying. That’s pretty nice. It makes a guy feel good. Obviously, I’ve just got to keep doing the right things, what I’ve been doing, and hopefully I can continue to get the same response.”

Continue reading ‘You like him, you really like him’ »

What happened in the third period last night, when the Kings let a three-goal lead slip away and to rally with two late goals? In Terry Murray’s view, the Kings lost some aggression when they got the big lead, and today, Murray took some of the responsibility on himself…

MURRAY: “I thought we came out with a `let’s protect the lead’ attitude, rather than staying aggressive and keep playing the same game. I’ve got to take some of the responsibility on that. At the end of the second period, we talked about our neutral-zone forecheck. They kept pulling the puck back, deep into the dots in their circles. You don’t want to get spread out, to where they’re able to make a couple passes and generate speed through the middle of the ice and catch everyone flat-footed. So we asked our F1 (forward) to pull back a little bit, five or six feet inside of the blue line, and let more of a compact look, line-change look, come at us.

“To me, it seemed like the reaction was that, `OK, we’ve got to be cautious in all areas of the ice now.’ Now it becomes a 4-3 game, and I like what we did in the next couple shifts. We came out and really did some good things with Zeus’ line and Kopi’s line. They had good offensive-zone time and got some opportunities. But to me, that’s the area of concern, and what we addressed in our team meeting today, that our mindset has to stay with that same, `Let’s go pressure the puck’ attitude.”

Michal Handzus had a veteran’s “therapy day,” but the rest of the Kings were on the ice.

Terry Murray expressed great dissatisfaction with the Kings’ third period, took some of the blame himself and said that lineup changes would be coming tomorrow. Murray said Daqvis Drewiske isn’t quite ready, from a conditioning standpoint, to play. Peter Harrold practiced as a defenseman today, so there’s one major hint. More from practice a bit later…

Some notes from last night’s games, plus a bonus video at the end…

– The Kings have tied a franchise record with their eight-game winning streak (also done in 1991-92 and 1972-73). The Kings are also 10-1 in their last 11 games.

– Anze Kopitar has an eight-game point streak (seven goals, eight assists), which ties his career-high (also done Nov. 28-Dec. 12, 2007). Kopitar’s four-point night (two goals, two assists) tied a career high (Feb. 16, 2009). The Kings have a 17-3-0 record when Kopitar scores a goal this season.

Continue reading ‘Feb. 4 game notes’ »

For those who are still interested, I’ve been able to piece together most of what went on from the Kings’ side of the Kovalchuk situation.

The essential reason that a trade didn’t get done, and never really got close — and basically why I found information so hard to come by in recent days — is that the Kings and Thrashers never really moved beyond the initial sticking point. When I first addressed about the subject, around 10 days ago, I wrote the following: “The issue, for the Kings and other teams, is going to be the willingness to give up players currently on the NHL roster. Atlanta isn’t necessarily looking for a prospects-and-picks rebuild, a la Dean Lombardi. They have franchise viability issues, and they need to keep their NHL team looking reasonably strong.”

That remained the sticking point. In the end, the Kings simply didn’t want to take players out of their locker room for a rental. Atlanta sniffed around Dustin Brown, Jack Johnson and Wayne Simmonds, at least one of whom would have had to have been the center of a trade package. Atlanta wanted NHL players. The Kings offered prospects. There wasn’t going to be a fit unless one side budged, and neither did. In the end, I think Don Waddell did pretty good for himself under the circumstances, getting two NHL players, a prospect and a first-round pick for a rental player, albeit a fantastic one.

When it came down to it, Lombardi simply didn’t want to break up the locker room, especially for a player who might walk in three months anyway. There’s still, of course, the option that Kovalchuk could sign during the summer, presuming he intends to keep playing in the NHL. It’s been a fascinating story, and it’s definitely not done yet.