Brian Kennedy

Fowler Topples Jackets

Fowler Topples Jackets

Self-effacing as always, here’s what Cam Fowler of the Ducks said after his hat trick goal, the last one in OT, which snapped a seven-game winless streak for Anaheim: “[After the goal] I couldn’t see anything. I was getting bombarded. I was getting punched in the...

Enjoy Your Own Way

Enjoy Your Own Way

Two sweaters now hang in the rafters at Honda Center in Anaheim. One belongs to a beloved son who scored 457 goals with the team and leads them in most meaningful statistical categories. The other one belongs to a prodigal who has recently returned and who never quite...

“A Little Befumbled”

“A Little Befumbled”

After the Kings’ 5-1 loss to Buffalo on Saturday afternoon, they kept us out of the locker room for a long, long time. So much so that the PHWA chapter, of which I am glad to be a member, planned to let the league know that the Kings had violated league rules. When...

Twenty-five Years On, Revenge (?)

Twenty-five Years On, Revenge (?)

Twenty-five years ago, a movie that had been a really bad idea came to life in the form of a hockey team when the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim were born. On October 8th, 1993, they played their first game, and their first home game. It was versus the Detroit Red Wings. The...

Campbell Spells Quick

Campbell Spells Quick

LA defeated the visiting Red Wings Sunday night in a game which saw them start their former backup netminder, Jack Campbell. Former? Yup, Peter Budaj is now backing up. What’s missing? Quick. No, I don’t mean, be quick with your answer. I mean Quick’s missing, down...

CopyCat Friday Night

CopyCat Friday Night

The Kings came out to play Friday night. They almost never play on Fridays. They’ll be back at it on Sunday evening. That’s unusual, too. What wasn’t out of character was their performance. They could get two goals but not the third, and they lost to San Jose in OT....

California Threatens Once More

California Threatens Once More

California has been a tough go for teams from all parts of the country and Canada over the past several years. It’s a common question to teams who visit the Anaheim-LA-San Jose juggernaut whether they’re happy with a split, or even just to get two points. Sometimes,...

Close, But Good Enough

Close, But Good Enough

The Golden Knights-Kings series has been a goaltending battle for the ages, with each game being decided by one goal in an ascending range. The first, 1-0; the second, 2-1 (OT); the third, 3-2. As the fourth began, the Kings were facing elimination. You might thus...

Battle Royal(e)

Battle Royal(e)

In a series dominated by two goalies at the peak of their games, it only made sense that Marc-Andre Fleury and Jonathan Quick would do it once more Sunday night with their series returned to LA. Save for save, they matched each other, Quick helped by a goal that...

See You Later?

See You Later?

There wasn’t much to be said in advance of the Ducks-Sharks game on Saturday night except one thing: the Ducks better be better, or there might not be a game five late next week. This could be the end of hockey in Anaheim for the year. They had been terrible two...

No Surprise Here?

No Surprise Here?

Is anybody going to surprise anybody this playoff season? Looking at the matchups, it seems surprisingly easy to call most of the series. That Washington-Columbus one might be a bit sticky, and who knows what Vegas is really capable of, but otherwise, it’s fairly...

Brown’s Pants Trick

Brown’s Pants Trick

Playing for nothing. It’s not just the fate of the non-playoff team. It’s also what haunts the mind of the teams that have clinched but who could move up or down the standings pending the outcome of the last regular-season games. That’s the case for the LA Kings. They...

Kings Inch Closer

Kings Inch Closer

In the ongoing saga of who wants and who does not want to get into the NHL playoffs from the Western Conference, the Avs blew a point and squeaked a point on Sunday (Anaheim beat them in OT), then headed up the freeway to faceoff with the Kings. Freeway. Faceoff....

Ducks Pull OT Miracle–Again

Ducks Pull OT Miracle–Again

Neither team could afford to give up two points. Other teams fighting for the final playoff spot in the Western Conference didn’t want the game to be a three-point affair. That was the story at Honda Center on Sunday night as the Avalanche visited the Ducks at an...

Another Three-Pointer

Another Three-Pointer

If you were wondering where the Kings-Ducks rivalry went somewhere around 2012, and thought you saw it come back in  2014 when the Kings beat Anaheim in a come-from-behind seven-game win, you probably like this year a ton. The hatred is back. And it’s not just...

Who’s Better: Kings or Ducks?

Who’s Better: Kings or Ducks?

What do you think of the mutual opponent hypothesis? What’s that? The idea that if team A and team B each play team C, then whoever does better against team C would do better against the other, as well. If it’s anything to go by, the Anaheim Ducks are in a sweet spot...

Ducks Face Distractions, Prevail

Ducks Face Distractions, Prevail

It might seem odd to say this. Perhaps even cruel. But here’s the analysis of the Detroit-Ducks game Friday night: A bad team got a mediocre-but-still-hopeful team off its game by distracting them with taunts that led to fights and chippy play that led to penalties....

Letting Them Hang Around

Letting Them Hang Around

The Kings let the Red Wings hang around and hang around on Thursday night, playing as if they had all the points to spare in the playoff race. They don’t. The shots opened 6-0 for the Kings, but it took much of the first period to get there. They scored along the way,...

Do What You Say

Do What You Say

Standing in front of Jonathan Toews in the Chicago dressing room on Saturday in LA, what came to mind in the aftermath of their come from behind spanking of the Kings was this: What makes this team so bad this year? The thought was the result of knowing how they can...

Kings Black(Hawk) Out

Kings Black(Hawk) Out

The LA Kings flat blew it on Saturday afternoon with Chicago in town. Not only did they lose to a statistically weaker opponent, they did in in dramatic fashion. After period two, in which Los Angeles poured in three goals, two on egregious turnovers by Chicago, it...

Another Three-Pointer

Tell Your Teammates

You want to make the playoffs, right, Anaheim Ducks? I mean really, really wanna with all your heart? Well you don’t let a weaker team come into our building and score with thirteen seconds gone in the first period off a turnover that your captain makes. At center...

Confessing to the Crime

Confessing to the Crime

It was a sad night in SoCal Saturday. Sad, and a little bit pathetic. The two NHL teams, like Casey at the bat, struck out. For no good reason, because each of them was playing a team either below them or significantly below them in the standings. And both lost and...

The Sharks Get It

The Sharks Get It

Anaheim Ducks fans love their number seven, Andrew Cogliano. They thought the two-game suspension which ended his consecutive-games streak a ripoff. They were right about that. But Lord love him, if this guy’s hands were any more stony, he’d never be able to floss his...

Ducks Slow Down McDavid

Ducks Slow Down McDavid

The Ducks beat the Oilers in Anaheim on Friday night, and all anyone could do after the game was talk about Connor McDavid. Could this be because on the first series of plays in the game he grabbed a puck and went to the right of the Ducks’ zone, then burst around Cam...

Oilers Inconsistent–Again

Oilers Inconsistent–Again

It looked to be a boring game with few shots and an easy win for the home team in Los Angeles Wednesday night. The Kings opened a lead with just over a minute gone. Here’s the situation: right off a faceoff, the puck went from center to Kyle Clifford. He zipped a...

Can the Ducks Compete?

Can the Ducks Compete?

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- Sure, you’re tempted to ask the easy question—can the Ducks make the playoffs? Sure they can. Ask the hard question: can the Ducks compete? They got partway to answering that on Thursday night versus the Winnipeg Jets. So how would they make it?...

Blenderized

Blenderized

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- The coach of the other local NHL team, John Stevens of the LA Kings, used the “blender” metaphor last week to describe the changes his team needed to make to jolt themselves into scoring some goals. But it was Randy Carlyle of the Ducks who really...

Dismantling the Ducks

Dismantling the Ducks

The San Jose Sharks defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins last week. Just like the Anaheim Ducks did. The San Jose Sharks defeated the LA Kings last week. Just like the Anaheim Ducks did. Thus an Anaheim-San Jose matchup looked to be a pretty good battle, maybe even an...

How to Be Invisible

How to Be Invisible

For all the hype, none of the pertinent questions about the Kings and Ducks were easily answered Friday night. And especially not the one Kings fans wanted answered: Where’s the offense? Invisible, in the form of many of the key players. In fact, before the first...

Penguins Squash Kings

Penguins Squash Kings

The LA Kings played decent hockey for periods of Thursday’s game versus the Pittsburgh Penguins. But with talent like that on the other side of the ice, that’s not good enough. LA ended up on the short end of a 3-1 score, losing for the fifth time in a row. They...

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