The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Kings claim first crown
Los Angeles wins series over Devils for first league title.
The only eighth-seeded team to win an NHL championship, L.A. throttles the New Jersey Devils 6-1 in Game 6.
The Los Angeles Kings’ 45-year Stanley Cup quest ended in a triumphant flourish of blood, sweat and power-play goals. After missing two chances to claim the title last week, the long-suffering Kings are NHL champions for the first time.
Jeff Carter and Trevor Lewis scored two goals apiece, playoff MVP Jonathan Quick made 17 saves, and the Kings beat the New Jersey Devils 61 Monday night in Game 6 of the finals, becoming the first eighth-seeded playoff team to win the league title.
Dustin Brown had a goal and two assists for Los Angeles, which ended its dominant two-month playoff run before a frenzied bunch of their heartiest fans, incessantly waving towels and glowsticks. The crowd including several dozen Kings faithful who have been at rinkside since the team’s beginnings as an expansion franchise in 1967, waiting for one glimpse of the Stanley Cup.
After taking a 3-0 series lead and then losing two potential clinching games last week, the Kings finished ferociously at Staples Center just when the sixth-seeded Devils appeared to have a chance for one of the biggest comebacks in finals history.
One penalty abruptly changed the tone of a series. Brown, Carter and Lewis scored during a five-minute power play in the first period after Steve Bernier was ejected for boarding Rob Scuderi, leaving the veteran defenseman in a pool of blood.
Quick took it from there, finishing his starmaking postseason by allowing just seven goals in six finals games.
“You never know. You get to the dance, you never know what’s going to happen,” Brown said. “We calmed down after losing two. It was the first time we had done that all playoffs, and we finally got off to a good start.”
Martin Brodeur stopped 19 shots for the Eastern Conference champion Devils, just the third team to force a Game 6 in the finals after falling into an 0-3 hole. Rookie Adam Henrique ended Quick’s shutout bid late in the second period after the Kings had built a 4-0 lead, but Lewis and Matt Greene added late goals for the Kings.
The Kings went 16-4 after barely making the playoffs, eliminating the top three seeds in the Western Conference before matching the secondfastest run to a title in NHL history.
Los Angeles boasted a talented, balanced roster that peaked at the absolute perfect time under midseason coaching hire Darryl Sutter. Brown, just the second American-born captain to raise the Cup, accomplished what even Wayne Gretzky couldn’t do in eight years in Los Angeles.
With the Kings’ victory Monday night, St. Louis becomes the only existing team from the NHL’s first expansion in 1967 that has yet to win a championship.
That Second Six expansion class doubled the sixteam league’s size and forever changed the game from an insular, Northeast-based sport to a continentwide endeavor.
Los Angeles also becomes the fourth straight team to end a lengthy drought by winning the Cup. The Bruins, last year’s champion, hadn’t won since 1972, 2010 champion Chicago hadn’t won since 1961 — the NHL’s longest drought at the time — and 2009 Cup winners Pittsburgh had only waited since 1992. Toronto, which won its last Cup title in 1967, has the longest drought.