The Kings battled back from 2-0 and 3-2 deficits to steal a 4-3 win over the St. Louis Blues and get this series even at 2 wins apiece. The irony is that I had heard 3 different soundbytes on the radio this morning from Kings players saying how important it was to get off to a quick start in game 4 on home ice. Well that thought quickly fell apart as St. Louis scored just 1:12 into the game followed by a 2-0 lead 3 minutes and 20 seconds later. So then what?

Well the Kings got one back at 9:44 of the first period on a perfect pass by Mike Richards to his buddy Jeff Carter who buried it for his first goal of the playoffs and before you knew it, Dustin Penner had tied it at 14:30. But the Blues T.J. Oshie scored his 2nd of the night as the lone 2nd period goal and the Kings had to find another way to fight their way back. And it was the unlikely guy (due to his 19 game drought) Anze Kopitar who tied it at 7:14 of the 3rd period on a gorgeous set-up play from captain Dustin Brown helping Kopi score his first goal since March 25th. And maybe the Kings best player in this series Justin Williams got the game winner on a tip-in of a Mike Richards shot at 8:30 and the Kings held on for a huge win that sends them to St. Louis in what is now a best of 3 series starting on Wednesday night.

The following are my postgame chats from the locker room and they were all cautiously stoked about their chances during the rest of this series…

Kings coach Darryl Sutter:

Kings captain Dustin Brown:

Kings center Anze Kopitar finally had a personal reason to smile again:

Kings center Mike Richards who got 2 big helpers and continues to play as steady as they come:

Kings right winger Dustin Penner:

Kings goalie Jonathan Quick:

I’m still sticking with my previous prediction that the winner of game 3 (which was the Kings) will be the club advancing to the 2nd round. And now it’s a brand new series…but which L.A. team will show up for game 5? Hopefully we’ll know in the first few minutes of the game…but don’t bet on it! 🙂