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In a rematch series that looked like the Blackhawks were going to take the throne of the Western Conference Final, the Kings not for once gave up on tying the series with the Chicago Blackhawks at United Center. The Kings gave up two goals on poor plays but Jonathan Quick, who I’ve been talking about this whole series on how phenomenal he has been, made some incredible saves to keep the Kings in the game and get them rolling offensively and dominate the rest of the game.
Jeff Carter who has had a great run in this post-season, scored a hat trick part of the six goals in less than 20 minutes and gave the Kings a 6-2 win in game 2 of the Western Conference Final to even the series and bring a win with them to LA.
The Blackhawks looked strong in the first period opening the score with a power play goal from Nick Leddy who was assisted by Duncan Keith. In the second period Ben Smith scored his second goal of the post-season to give the Hawks a 2-0 lead and put up hopes for the Hawks to take a 2-0 lead in the Conference Final. But that didn’t stop the Kings. Justin Williams opened the scoring for the Kings with a goal in the 18th minute of the 2nd period with assists coming from Mike Richards and Dwight King.
In the third period, two penalties caused by Brandon Bollig and Bradon Saad gave the Kings a chance to score two power play goals and give them a 3-2 lead with goals coming from Jeff Carter and Jake Muzzin. Toffoli and Pearson, who look great when in the ice together, created a goal with Toffoli getting it behind the net with assist coming from Tanner Pearson and Jeff Carter. In the 14th minute, Jeff Carter scored his second goal of the game with assist coming again from Tanner Pearson and Matt Greene and then again scoring in the 16th minute with an empty net, giving him a total of 3 goals and scoring the hat trick of the game.
With the Kings winning game 2 of the series, they ended three streaks the Blackhawks and teams scoring first had. When teams scoring first in this post-season, there was a 27-1 record and they would take the win, but with the Kings winning Game 2 after being behind 2 goals, ended that streak. Also the Blackhawks had a 7-0 winning streak at home and a 7-0 winning streak against the Kings in the post-season, but with the LA Kings winning today, that ended the streaks as well. Quick had a total of 25 saves and Crawford, who looked as great as he looked in Game 1 but then struggled in the 3rd period, had 30 saves in Game 2.
The Kings continue to fight on in this post-season and have home court advantage in Game’s 3 &4 giving them the chance to take a 3-1 lead in the Western Conference Finals, but as always, they will have to fight for it to be able to go on to the Stanley Cup and win the rematch series against the Blackhawks. Game 3 will take place at Staples Center and the puck will drop at 8PM ET/5PM PT.
1st Period:
14:16 CHI: PPG-Nick Leddy (1) Backhand shot – ASST: Duncan Keith (7) 1-0 CHI
2nd Period
01:40 CHI: Ben Smith (2) Wrist Shot – ASST: Brandon Bollig (1), Johnny Oduya (4) 2-0 CHI
18:14 LAK: Justin Williams (6) Tip-in – ASST: Mike Richards (4), Dwight King (3) 2-1 CHI
3rd Period
01:37 LAK: PPG-Jeff Carter (5) Wrist Shot – ASST: Drew Doughty (9), Slava Voynov (4) 2-2 TIE
04:04 LAK:PPG-Jake Muzzin (4) Slapshot – ASST: Alec Martinez (5), Marian Gaborik (7) 3-2 LAK
08:59 LAK: Tyler Toffoli (5) Wirst Shot – ASST: Tanner Pearson (6), Jeff Carter (9) 4-2 LAK
14:44 LAK: Jeff Carter (6) Wrist Shot – ASST: Tanner Pearson (7), Matt Greene (1) 5-2 LAK
16:29 LAK: EN-Jeff Carter (7) – ASST: None 6-2 LAK
