Adios, St. Louis. The Blues bowed out of the Stanley Cup Playoffs with a 2-1 loss to the Los Angeles Kings in an elimination game. And it was all Jonathan Quick's fault.
Kings vs. Blues game recap: Los Angeles finishes off St. Louis
The Kings advanced after winning their tenth consecutive home game.
Quick faced just 22 shots, but many of them were quality scoring chances. The Quick we’ve seen over the last four games is quite similar to the Conn Smythe Quick we saw last summer. He turned away 21 shots with flair and skill, and the Blues ultimately had no chance.
The final minutes were a bit of a flurry, but the Kings protected their net well. The series loss marks the first time the Blues have lost a round after taking a 2-0 lead, and St. Louis has now lost its last eight elimination games.
Have the Kings finally gotten Anze Kopitar going?
I wouldn’t say that Kopitar was invisible on Friday, but he was pretty close. He didn’t register a single shot on net and his only real impact on the game was the six hits he threw. Right now, Quick is carrying this team but he could use some help from the Kings’ best forward.
Will Brian Elliott give up a goal as embarrassing as the Voynov’s Game 5 winner?
Elliott was outstanding. The only goal you could try to call embarrassing was Dustin Penner's game-winner with 0.2 remaining in the second period, but that one was a knuckler and any goalie would have been hard-pressed to stop it. It was a good effort from Elliott.
Can St. Louis win on the road?
It might’ve been a winnable game for St. Louis on paper, but the Kings are just playing out of their minds at home recently. L.A. has won its last ten home games, and the energy at Staples proved it.
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