A good morning in Slovenia

No doubt, there were some happy people with bleary eyes this morning in Jesenice, the town in northwest Slovenia with a population of approximately 20,000. That’s the hometown of Anze Kopitar, who scored the overtime goal in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals. Kopitar is one of Slovenia’s sporting heroes, and in Jesenice, a crowd of approximately 200 people gathered outside in a plaza area to watch Kopitar and the Kings take on the New Jersey Devils. It was Hockey Morning in Slovenia. The opening faceoff took place at 2:22 a.m. local time, and Kopitar ended the game at 5:14 a.m., just in time for folks to get ready for work, perhaps. Kopitar got word of the celebration back home and said, “I think everybody was pretty excited. I don’t think anybody was more excited than me.’’

Today was a new day, though, and Kopitar said it would be easy to put the big goal behind him. “This time of the year, you’ve got to enjoy it that night and then move on the next day and get focused for Game 2,’’ Kopitar said. For one more look at Kopitar’s goal, from a unique perspective, check out this KingsVision video, shot with a special high-speed camera…

Rules for Blog Commenting

  • No profanity, slurs or other offensive language. Replacing letters with symbols does not turn expletives into non-expletives.
  • Personal attacks against other blog commenters, and/or blatant attempts to antagonize other comments, are not tolerated. Respectful disagreement is encouraged. Posts that continually express the same singular opinion will be deleted.
  • Comments that incite political, religious or similar debates will be deleted.
  • Please do not discuss, or post links to websites that illegally stream NHL games.
  • Posting under multiple user names is not allowed. Do not type in all caps. All violations are subject to comment deletion and/or banning of commenters, per the discretion of the blog administrator.

Repeated violations of the blog rules will result in site bans, commensurate with the nature and number of offenses.

Please flag any comments that violate the site rules for moderation. For immediate problems regarding problematic posts, please email zdooley@lakings.com.