The 2012 Stanley Cup Final begins on Wednesday May 30 and features the Los Angeles Kings and New Jersey Devils in an unexpected final series that is all too familiar to hockey fans as cinderella runs seem to be the norm.
The Los Angeles Kings, an eighth seed in the Western Conference, knocking off the Presidents Trophy winning Vancouver Canucks in the first round, followed by the Blues and Coyotes, look to continue to surprise on their way to a Stanley Cup.
While the New Jersey Devils, no strangers to the Stanley Cup Final, look to give future hall of fame goaltender Martin Brodeur his fourth Cup in what just might be his last chance to hoist hockey's holy grail. In normal circumstances the Devils would be considered the heavy favorites over a team that finished as the last seed into the playoffs, but the Kings were in the Pacific Division title race until the final week of the season and have proven to be a tough, physical hockey club and have only lost two games on their way to the final.
Led by physical power forward and captain Dustin Brown, former Cup winner Brad Richards, top defenseman Drew Doughty, and Yorkton product Jarret Stoll the Kings have played "playoff hockey" since game one of the first round and have bullied teams to submission with their aggressive forechecking and hitting. Combined with the brilliant goaltending of Jonathan Quick the Kings have a complete team and provide the Devils with problems in every facet of the series match ups.
However the Devils do have veteran leadership in Zach Parise, who scored the last second game tying goal in the 2010 Vancouver Olympics Gold Medal Game for Team USA, forcing the game into overtime, if the Devils are to finally put the Kings on their heels they will need more clutch performances from their captain. Past Parise, the Devils have rookie Adam Henrique who has two series winning overtime goals in his magical playoff run, and infamous Russian sniper and scoring machine Ilya Kovalchuk who has seemed to turn around his bad habits and is four wins away from getting the ring that no one expected he could get.
However, like every team that has crossed the Kings path, the Devils have yet to show that they can play through the physical challenge that the Kings are promised to bring to the table.
If the undersized Devils can play through all the hard hitting that the Kings big forwards and defense pairs are going to throw at them this series will be much closer than the Kings prior match ups, which will be easier said than done. Perhaps the Devils can lean on Martin Brodeur turning back the clock for a two week stretch of brilliance and steal a few games, but if that was to happen Brodeur would have to significantly step up his game from the shaky plays he made in game five of the Eastern Conference finals when he allowed the Rangers to tie the game off two shaky goals that nearly changed the outcome of the series.
As far as a prediction goes the Devils simply have not shown that they are as dominant of a Conference champion in their run as they Kings have, so I will have to run with the hot 12-2 record of the Los Angeles Kings and their Yorkton connection in a six game series win that might just be the classic series that fans deserve after a anti-climatic Kings run to the final.
