The past few seasons have seen the mere presence of the Los Angeles Kings in the Stanley Cup Playoffs put fear into teams. In 2012, the Kings survived several coaching changes to make the postseason as the eighth and final seed in the Western Conference. But the Kings didn’t follow the script that year as they went 12-1 in the first three rounds of the playoffs of the Stanley Cup Playoffs as they simply ran over the top teams in the Western Conference. And after that the New Jersey Devils weren’t going to be able to slow the Kings down from winning their first Stanley Cup Championship in franchise history. After being eliminated by the Chicago Blackhawks in the Western Conference Finals in 2013, the Kings would get back into the postseason in 2014 in a very big way. After losing the first three games of their first-round series to the Anaheim Ducks, the Kings would rally to win the next four games and take the series. The Kings would face a Game 7 on the road in the first three rounds of the playoffs and each time they came away victorious before dispatching of the New York Rangers in five games in the Stanley Cup Final for their second title in three years. The Kings have had a never-say-die attitude as playoff seeding has meant absolutely nothing to them. But the Kings were never able to fully rekindle that magic this season and for the first time since 2009, Los Angeles will be watching the playoffs from home.
The best way to describe the Kings 2014-2015 National Hockey League season is that they were “consistently inconsistent”. All season long the Kings exchanged long losing streaks for long winning streaks, and every time that you expected them to turn the corner, they always ended up right back at square one.
Jonathan Quick
A big part of the Kings two Stanley Cup Championships has been the play of goalie Jonathan Quick as when he’s on, there might not be a better net minder than him in the NHL. Quick is only allowing 2.25 goals per game this season while as a team the Kings 2.24 goals allowed average is seventh in the league. But sometimes when you’re as good as Quick is, the people around you rely on your skills too much. The Kings are 19th in goal scoring this season and center Jeff Carter is the only player currently on the Los Angeles roster that is in the top 30 of goals scored this season in the NHL. And once you factor in that the other 29 teams in the NHL will consistently get up for the Kings being that they’ve won two out of the last three Stanley Cup Titles, this team fought an uphill battle all season long.
Dean Lombardi
In spite of the fact that the playoffs are no longer on the agenda for Los Angeles this spring, that doesn’t mean that Kings general manager Dean Lombardi won’t be busy this summer. The contracts of right winger Justin Williams and center Jarrett Stoll are set to expire this summer. And after placing center Mike Richards on waivers earlier this season, you have to wonder how committed that the Kings will be to him going forward after recalling him as he’s under contract through 2020. The NHL’s salary cap number for next season is expected to be around $73 million and things will be tight for the Kings heading into season as some very tough hockey decisions will need to be made by Lombardi as far as who is going to be on L.A.’s roster.
For Lombardi and Kings head coach Darryl Sutter who have seen the best of times hockey wise in Los Angeles, this will be a very interesting summer.
Source: Spotrac.com
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