Half Time Report

Ok! More than 40 games has gone and we could say that the team first half was a success.  Leading most of the time the conference until Dallas woke up, the team sits now in 3rd place in the West. If everything goes well, thats where they should finish after 82 games.  The goal remain the same, win the Stanley Cup. Finishing on top of conference is really not a priority.  The away record is pretty good so not finishing in top 4 is not a priority. The main goal is to get to the conference final like last year hope for a better result. Dallas is strong so is Colorado.  We rather look at teams ahead of us but im keeping on eye on the Blackhawks.  They seems serious but will it lasts?  We couldn't worry less about the East where Ottawa seems to be ruling the Conference. Boston are trying but they are soft. I see them being oust in the first round.  One thing for sure, we would love to see a "royal" Stanley Cup matchup against the Senators and the Kings.  The Kings believe they have the experience and the talent to do it.

Although the team sucks in PK being last almost all year, the 22% in PP has been amongst the best of them all for most of the season.  Really, it doesn’t matter.  We want timely goals and wins.  Whatever the way we do it. Ironically, when we spoke with the Kings GM last year, knowing they didnt get the best goalie at the inaugural draft, they proud themself in getting a tough defense, it's been the offense that allowed them to be successful so far.  The top line of Toews - Jagr - Nyquist has never been split since game 1 last year,  they are probably the most productive of the league this year.  Toews is leading the league with 57 points, he is +16, Nyquist is +18 so is surprisingly young Jagr. Patrice Bergeron is having a terrific year with 13 goals and 47 points, the Ancienne-Lorette native is producing a point per game so far this season.  We could just imagine how his season would be if he has real 2nd line wingers playing with him, not offense to Pirri.  The team was counting on Stoll, Fehr and Prust to be a force on the 3rd line but they are all minus players.  The Kings hope to find the right mix before the playoffs starts.

On defense, Markov is the leader of the group. He is playing on his last contract year and it looks like he wants to stay in LA. Decision will have to be made in the off season.  Brent Burns is not expected to be a defensive juggernaut but his offense is on par on what we want from him.  Markov and Burns has 6 and 5 PP goals respectively. Thats really big and it really gives a good break to the forwards. Klein, Tanev, Lovejoy and Ericsson has shared the load pretty well so far on the 2nd and 3rd defense unit.  The grandfather of all Jordan Leopold has been giving everything that we wanted from him since he decided to stay one more year and he even scored 2 PP goals.

In net, well, we rather not think about next year and see how Bernier will be rated.  Let's focus on this year.  Bernier has been very solid considering the fact that the 3rd and 4th lines has not been given him all the chances to get better stats.  We even suggested that he should have been invited to the all-star game.  He is right up there with leaders in wins and his 2.33 goals per game is not too too bad.  Expect him to get some time off before the playoffs since he had already started the same amount of game this year compare to his last year total.  He got tired in the playoffs last year so don’t want that to happen again this year. McKenna has really been a disappointment.  Nothing is left to be said about him.

Prospect wise, we are really pleased with the progress of Shayne Gostisbehere, Joe Morrow and Zach Werenski. Gostisbehere has really been impressive with the NHL Flyers and has been a fixture on the PP for them, which is not a bad thing.  Morrow has been steady for the NHL Bruins playing regular minutes. As of late, he has been an healthy scratch but he is still learning to be an NHLer and should develop into a top 4 within the next 2 years. As for Werenski, the USA Team captain was voted best defenseman at the last Christmas WJC tournament and if we were to ask GM Lemyre's opinion, he would tell you he should be playing in the NHL right now if he wasn't playing college. He is physically ready and really playing beyond his (y)ears. :). Up front, Brayden Point was named Team Canada captain and the Kings believe that they got a great prospect and a future top 6 player. He just need to get stronger. Paul Bittner got hurt but should be an impact player in 2-3 years also. Adam Erne will need more time to adjust than expected. The NHL Tampa Bay prospect will be playing in the NHL/EHE one day but maybe later than the Kings would have like to.  The Kings has some decent prospects in net but Mason McDonald is the one we should keep and eye on.  Just like the other prospects not mentioned here, the Kings will take them when they are ready because they have no EHE timeline set for them.

Please stay tuned. The Kings organization will have a great announcement to made later next week.  Please be active on the site !

Good luck to all for the rest of the season !  May the best team win !