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| Inside the Sprint Center, Kansas City |
Tonight’s NHL pre-season game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Los Angeles Kings is sold out.
Now, I’m not sure if hockey fans in Kansas City are similar to the ones in California. But, I’m going to assume there is one major difference – when they look over the game rosters, they’re going to skip right past names like Dustin Brown, Mike Richards and Anze Kopitar. The name they’re probably most excited to see this evening is Davis Drewiske.
Wait…Davis Drewiske?
Yes, it was LA’s seldom-used defeseman who scored the very first goal in the new building, back in 2008.
The game-tape – if there even is any – will show it wasn’t a highlight reel goal though. In fact, with the Kings on the penalty kill, Drewiske was simply trying to clear the puck. The shot on goal wasn’t picked up by St. Louis Blues goaltender Chris Mason and the Kings were up 1-0 early in the second period.
They held on to win the game 2-1, with the other goals coming from Brad Richardson (Kings) and Paul Kariya (Blues).
Something else took place that night that probably meant little, if anything, to the 11,603 in attendance – Drew Doughty played his first NHL game.
I think it’s probably safe to assume there were a few more people hoping to see him tonight than even noticed him on the ice last time.
So, come to think of it, maybe hockey fans in Kansas City and Los Angeles do have something in common after all.
Here are the projected line-ups for the game.
Dustin Penner – Mike Richards – Trent Hunter
Dwight King – Jarret Stoll – Dustin Brown
Jordan Nolan – Andrei Loktionov – Justin Williams
Kyle Clifford – Trevor Lewis – Ethan Moreau
Rob Scuderi – Jack Johnson
Alec Martinez – Matt Greene
David Drewiske – Slava Voynov
Jonathan Bernier
Jeff Zatkoff
Pittsburgh Penguins
Eric Tangradi – Evgeni Malkin – James Neal
Chris Kunitz – Jordan Staal – Tyler Kennedy
Richard Park – Mark Letestu – Nick Johnson
Steve MacIntyre – Joe Vitale – Craig Adams
Ben Lovejoy – Matt Niskanen
Paul Martin – Joesph Morrow
Brian Strait – Scott Harrington
Marc-Andre Fleury
Brad Thiessen
Puck drops at 5pm PST, radio only.
The Mayor
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Kopitar Out, Can Watch His Son Against Arizona
Per recent tradition, it will be the Kings and Coyotes in a pair of split-squad games to open up preseason on Tuesday night.
LA captain Anze Kopitar will not suit up, but he will get a chance to watch his son play.
Allow us to explain…
“Last season when [Jaret Anderson-Dolan] made the team out of camp and […]