Kings coach Terry Murray has decided to put last year’s best line back together again. Ryan Smyth, Anze Kopitar and Justin Williams will be the top unit tomorrow night against the St. Louis Blues.
As noted yesterday, it was back on January 13, 1979 that the Kings most famous trio – the Triple Crown Line – were first put together. Could the timing prove to be a good omen for this group?
Expecting performance similar to Simmer-Dionne-Taylor may be too lofty of a goal right now, although seeing the three back together again after all the success they had early last season is an encouraging sign for a club desperately needing a jump start.
After practice today, both Murray and Smyth shared some comments about the reunion…
First up, Murray on the reasons for the change – “It’s not that I was not pleased with Brownie and Kopi – because I thought the two of those guys were doing a very good job this year, putting up some good numbers. But, I just felt that with Smitty (Smyth) there on that left side, he can do some of the stuff we were talking about with Sturm (earlier in the scrum), creating plays. I look at Kopi as a player who is a playmaker and he’s a shooter. He’s got a power, heavy shot and I’d to see him use that more. The only way I can make that happen is try and get someone on that wing that’s going to create some plays and find what I’m looking for on a more consistent basis. So, that was part of the rationale. The other part is we’ve lost games and we have to get something going here.”
MM: How excited are you to have the old gang back together again?
RS: This game is all about opportunity. You want to take full advantage of it, make the best of it. I thought we played really well last year together at the start of the year. We’d like to get back to that for sure. It’s going to take work. It’s going to take hopefully a couple of periods and we can get right into it. But, if we can just stick to it – whatever the game plan is that’s set out for us – and go to work.
Assuming they can find some of their old magic, the line still needs a good nickname. If you have any suggestions, throw ’em out there.
The Mayor
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