Line evolution

On the flight home last night, I went through the on-ice report and tried to figure out all the line combinations in the third period. There’s nothing big behind it… I just always find it interesting to see which players are trusted by coaches in important situations. The Kings started off the third period with….

Smyth-Kopitar-Williams
Parse-Stoll-Brown
Purcell-Richardson-Simmonds

Then, the second time through the rotation, they added:

Ivanans-Handzus-Frolov

Then that line got skipped, and when it came back, Ivanans was gone, and a winger got double-shifted on that line for the rest of the period. First it was Smyth, then Parse, then Richardson. Stoll and Brown also had shifts with Richardson and Purcell. After the Stoll penalty, it was “all hands on deck” for the last couple minutes. Here are the shift totals in the third period for each forward…

Kopitar 10
Smyth 10
Brown 8
Simmonds 8
Stoll 8
Williams 7
Handzus 6
Parse 6
Purcell 6
Richardson 6
Frolov 5
Ivanans 1

Something for us to chew on, since practice doesn’t start until 12:30 p.m. today…