Kings vs Blues: Beaten With a Shillelagh

According to Wikipedia, a shillelagh is a stick Irishmen once used to fight.  Right at the moment, I'm inclined to believe all the members of the St. Louis Blues ARE Irishmen and they thought their hockey sticks were actually shillelaghs, because they beat the Kings senseless tonight.

The puck is back there, Quicker....

On the walk home from the game, I was thinking of possible explanations for the Kings performance tonight:

• Leprechauns snuck into the equipment room before the game and cursed all our sticks.
• O'Johnson, O'Doughty, O'Kopitar and O'Simmonds decided to rebel against getting their names changed and played like crap.
• Drew spotted The Queen in an O'Doughty shirt, got confused and figured she left him for another guy.
• The Gatorade bottles were actually filled with green beer.
• The boys were confused by the new uniforms, thought they were the Philadelphia Eagles and forgot they were playing hockey, not football.

So Simmer, you're going out about 30 yards and I'll hit you with the pass....cool?

Here are the more likely answers:

• St. Louis played a faster, more physical game than we came prepared for.
• We had no puck possession, and couldn't connect a tape to tape pass if our lives depended on it.
• We spent 75% of the game in our own zone.
• We couldn't put shots on net.  Lack of puck possession will allow that to happen.

So...we're off to a SLOW start...

You've gotta be kidding me!

WTH HAPPENED!

• To a man, no one showed up to play.  Except maybe Jon Quick, and the team repaid him by playing with as many holes as Swiss cheese.

So the Kings got shelled, the fans booed at the end of the 2nd AND 3rd period, and my seat buddy was so disgusted she left before the end of the game to beat traffic.  Actually, a lot of people left.  By the end of this debacle the arena was only about one third full.    What a huge disappointment that our team played so well on the road, only to leave their hometown fans disappointed with their near total lack of effort this evening.

There were a couple of bright spots to the evening.

The green jerseys the Kings wore during warm-ups are being signed and auctioned to raise money for The Kings Care Foundation and Japan Earthquake Relief.  The Handuzs, Drewiske, Harrold, Richardson and Simmonds jerseys were done at the game tonight.  But if you're interested in another player besides those 5, you can place bids on the NHL website until March 25th.  Here's the link:

http://auction.nhl.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/User?id=losNHL&wl=12717464&type=L

Even Bailey's jersey is being auctioned!

The Kings "Heroes of the Game" were the Los Angeles Police Department Medal of Honor winners.  Give them your love, because they keep us safe.

And finally, please send all your healing karma to two members of the Los Angeles Kings family.  Jon Moncrief, who covers the Kings for The Examiner, and Michael Zampelli (aka Rink Rat) who runs the Let's Go Kings fan site and is also a professional photographer who covers the Kings, have both been in the hospital this week.   I am privileged to call Jon a friend, and Michael was more than patient with my photography questions the last two seasons when I sat behind his shooting spot in Section 114.  Staples Center is not the same without either of them.  Let's hope they return to action soon.

Hopefully the Kings can have short memories and shake off this loss fast, because the cross-town rival Anaheim Ducks are in town Saturday night in the first of 3 meetings between now and the end of the season with HUGE play-off implications for both squads.  Saturday is also the Kings final Heritage Night this season, this time honoring Bob Pulford.

GO KINGS GO!