[TSFH Fan]

Elite Snipers 101
by Jonathan Quick
http://www.theplayerstribune.com/jonath ... s-snipers/

Excerpt:

How many times have you heard this line before? “Aw come on, it wasn’t a great save. He shot it right into the goalie’s glove!”

It always bothers me when people use this to discredit an amazing glove save, because I feel like it means that people don’t understand the beauty of my position. In the NHL, 90 percent of the save happens before the player shoots the puck. As a goalie, if you’re relying on your reaction time to make saves, you’re going to get yanked in a hurry. Keeping pucks out of the net is mostly about intuition and geometry. You’re watching the puck carrier and processing all of the guy’s options on the ice, plus you’re looking at his feet, hands and body positioning. Is he shooting? High or low? Where’s his passing lane? What’s the play here? . . .

continue at http://www.theplayerstribune.com/jonath ... s-snipers/

[TSFH Fan]

[TSFH Fan]

Elite Snipers 101: Part 2
by Jonathan Quick
http://www.theplayerstribune.com/jonath ... rs-part-2/

Excerpt:

On the wall, there’s only one Jaromir Jagr. He’s been playing keep-away for 20 years and no one has figured out how to take the puck off him. But Kopi is as close as you’re going to get to Jagr at protecting the puck. He’s up against the opposition’s best defensemen every night, and yet he’s able to use his strength to lean on them, wear them down, and create space for himself and others. Anze grinds down opponents with those “heavy minutes” that keep goalies deep in their knees and trap opposing centers deep at their own goal line. That’s why you might not see a lot of Anze on SportsCenter, because he does the dirty work 10 seconds before the goal that doesn’t fit into the highlight.

[TSFH Fan]

Didn't expect this, but not terribly upset:

Slava Voynov is returning to Russia, leaving LA Kings
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/slava-voyn ... --nhl.html
By GREG BEACHAM (AP Sports Writer)
2 hours ago
AP - Sports

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Defenseman Slava Voynov announced Wednesday that he will return home to Russia with his family, leaving the Los Angeles Kings in the wake of his legal troubles on domestic violence charges.

Voynov announced his intentions in a statement through his agent, Rolland Hedges. The two-time Stanley Cup champion apologized to ''those in and around the game of hockey who have been affected by my situation.''

''I also wish the players of the LA Kings success in the future,'' Voynov said.

The Kings also released a statement announcing they had planned to terminate the final four seasons of Voynov's contract on Thursday. The move is no longer necessary, since Voynov's departure ends the contract.

Voynov pleaded no contest in July to a misdemeanor charge of domestic violence against his wife, Marta Varlamova. He was initially charged with a felony after a prolonged fight with his wife in late October.

Police said Voynov punched, kicked and choked Varlamova, sending her to an emergency room with injuries. Through the couple's lawyers, Varlamova later characterized the incident as an accident.

Voynov accepted a plea deal shortly before his scheduled trial, and he spent two months in jail before his release two weeks ago, when he was taken into custody by federal immigration officials. Voynov seemed likely to be deported after losing his work visa.

He has been suspended by the NHL since his arrest in late October 2014. The Kings also suspended him this summer when he injured himself in an undisclosed non-hockey activity.

Voynov's decision to leave North America will clear roster space and salary cap room for the Kings, who signed him to a six-year, $25 million contract extension in June 2013.

The 25-year-old Voynov won the Stanley Cup as an NHL rookie with the Kings in 2012, and he was the No. 2 defenseman on Los Angeles' second championship team in 2014. He also played for Russia at the Sochi Olympics, establishing himself as one of the nation's top defensemen.

Edit: Sauce

[bluecoconuts]

Fine by me. He was a great player, but there's no excuse for domestic violence. I just hope that he doesn't resort to hitting his wife back in Russia. I just wish we didn't get rid of Colin Miller, great right pairing offensive D-man, with a little more grooming he probably would have been the best replacement for Voynov.

[Hacksaw_64]

Milan Lucic sees LA Kings as long-term fit in 'perfect scenario'

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. – Milan Lucic feels like he’s at home near the Pacific Ocean.

The weather, the lifestyle the scenery – Lucic loves it all.

“Just being from Vancouver, I know I was in Boston for eight years and everything went really great for me there, but once you’re born and raised a West Coaster I think that’s always inside of you,” Lucic said after his first training camp skate with the Los Angeles Kings. “That’s something that only someone from the West Coast would understand.”

The West Coast routine, along with the way the Los Angeles Kings play hockey, make this place an ideal spot for the Vancouver native. Los Angeles acquired Lucic from Boston during NHL Draft weekend for a package that included goaltender Martin Jones.

Whether Lucic still sees it this way after the season is another story – he’s slated to be an unrestricted free agent after the year at the end of his three-year, $18 million deal. But the entire situation suits him well right now.

“In a perfect scenario, this would be a place I could see myself playing out the rest of my career,” he said. “Again, obviously it’s no secret I’m on the last year of my contract and going into a summer where I could potentially be a UFA, but at the end of the day, I’m not too worried about that.”

In Lucic’s first day of training camp, Kings coach Darryl Sutter put him on a line with Anze Kopitar at center and Marian Gaborik at wing. Granted, one day of training camp doesn’t make a line trio, but those three should bring speed with Gaborik, power with Lucic and two-way headiness with Kopitar.

“With our play because we do play a puck possession game, he gets into the corner and I know from playing against him it’s tough to take the puck off of him,” Kopitar said. “That’s how we want to play. We want to wear teams down and it’s certainly going to help us.”

The Kopitar-Lucic duo should be quite an interesting pair for the Kings. They’re both 6-foot-3 and have good speed for men their size. Both are also strong on the wall. But they’re also both coming off mediocre seasons – 64 points for the 28-year-old Kopitar and 44 for the 27-year-old Lucic. Both players scored fewer than 20 goals last season and both are looking for big, new deals. For Kopitar preferably with the Kings. For Lucic, who knows?

There are always rumors that he wants to return to Vancouver where he also played junior hockey.

But after the Vancouver Canucks made some questionable moves this past offseason, maybe Lucic is better off with Los Angeles, provided the Kings want him back.

Not only are the Kings tailored for Lucic’s style of play, Southern California offers a bevy of activities for him and his children. Disneyland is currently his family’s favorite outlet for fun.

“I know my wife has taken my older daughter three times since we’ve been here,” he said. “We’ve adjusted really well since we’ve been down here in California and we’ve been loving it ever since.”

While Lucic is a big presence on the ice, he’s outspoken and well-liked by his teammates off the ice.

“I don’t really know him all that well yet but just knowing how big a part of it he was in Boston, I’m sure any time you get a guy like that it always helps,” Kings captain Dustin Brown said.

He has the type of rugged forechecking style that could elicit cheers from Kings fans at Staples Center with a big hit. His powerful early shift in the 2007 Memorial Cup is still stuff of Vancouver Giants folklore.



“It’s the type of player we don’t have, we didn’t have clearly,” Kings coach Darryl Sutter said. “He’s a winner. He’s new to Los Angeles, but he’s not new to the league or new to hockey. I’ve seen him play for a long time.”

Is Lucic the missing piece to a Kings return to championship form? Last season, Los Angeles missed the playoffs. The team was absent of a certain ‘hard to play against’ element that it had when it won two Stanley Cups in three prior years.

It’s going to take more than just Lucic to get the Kings back to the playoffs. But as Lucic pointed out, he and the Kings both share that same hunger. With the Bruins last season, he missed the playoffs for the first time in his NHL career.

From the Giants through the Bruins and now to the Kings, there’s a certain winning demeanor Lucic has developed. Like Los Angeles last year, he slipped and that’s enough motivation to figure out how to get back to a championship level.

Said Lucic, “It’s been too long of an offseason.”

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nhl-puck- ... 18029.html


I like the move. Paid a lot to get him for a one year rental though.

[Hacksaw_64]

Milan Lucic gets into epic preseason hockey fight with Ducks’ defenseman
http://ftw.usatoday.com/2015/09/milan-l ... ight-ducks

It only took four games with his new team for Milan Lucic to drop the gloves.

Lucic, who has a reputation for, shall we say, his “physical” style of play, got into a minute-long tilt against Josh Manson of the Anaheim Ducks during the Los Angeles Kings preseason match-up Tuesday night.

Manson, coming to the aid of a teammate, grappled with Lucic for much longer than necessary for a preseason game. The duo are tied up at the start, split, and then go back to punching each others faces in. Neither the refs or their teammates make any move to split the duo apart.

The Ducks and Kings are arch rivals so a physical game between the two was to be expected, but this seems excessive. Lucic, already an established physical fighter, doesn’t really have anything to prove to his new team. Rather, this becomes a showcase for Manson to show to his teammates that he’s willing to risk a serious concussion in the name of team unity or whatever by getting his head bashed in.

Lucic eventually drops Manson to the ground after the Ducks defenseman basically can’t lift his hands anymore.

The Los Angeles Kings lost the game in 3-on-3 OT.

[TSFH Fan]

Toffoli!

[bluecoconuts]

Kings looking much better now, loving what I'm seeing the last few games.

[Hacksaw_64]

Toffoli-6, Ducks-6