Sharks vs Kings Final Score: Los Angeles Advances to Western Conference Finals After Game 7 Win
By Josh Hill
The Los Angeles Kings didn’t just win the battle of California on Tuesday night, they earned a spot in the Western Conference Finals with their 2-1 win over the San Jose Sharks in Game 7.
San Jose was playing much better than a 6-seed coming out of the first round where they swept the Vancouver Canucks but they ran into a brick wall in the Los Angeles Kings this round. The Kings were riding a cloud of their own as they were fresh off a series where they overcame the St. Louis Blues and continued their defense of their 2012 Stanley Cup trophy.
Justin Williams hadn’t had a goal in five games and he picked up a pair for the Kings Tuesday night which raced them out to s 2-0 lead in the second period. At that point it was looking like netminder Jonathan Quick had enough run support to carry Los Angeles to the Conference Finals but the night was far from over.
After trailing by a pair of goals heading into the third period, the Sharks picked up a much needed score by Dan Boyle which cut the Kings lead in half. But despite having the Sharks firing at him from all angles, Jonathan Quick held his own like he’s know to do and make some spectacular saves down the home stretch of the game to preserve the lead.
San Jose had perhaps their best scoring chance of the third period around the five minute mark where Jonthan Quick made a blocker save but was able to twist and contort his body with impeccable timing to almost take the puck off of the stick of the San Jose attack to steal what should have been a goal away from the Shark.
All the Sharks needed to do was flip the puck into the net which was mere inches from where the shot was being taken, but Quick flipped around to the puck and blocked the wide open angle.
San Jose pulled Antti Niemi with around a minute-and-a-half left in the game which actually presented a brilliant scoring chance as the Sharks had caught Los Angeles completely off guard. Los Angeles knew San Jose would pull Niemi to gain the extra attacker but it happened sooner than they thought and both Anze Kopitar and Mike Richards were off the ice. Brent Burns misfired on a golden opportunity and thus was the end of the Sharks night.
Los Angeles put both Kopitar and Richards back on the ice and the game was essentially done there but 100 percent of the late game credit goes to Quick and his brilliant defense of the net under heavy fire from the Sharks shooters.
The Kings now await the winner of Wednesday night’s showdown between the Chicago Blackhawks and Detroit Red Wings and judging from how well Los Angeles played in this series against San Jose, it’s looking like that defense of the Stanley Cup is a lot more likely than we initially thought.