Stanley Cup Finals 2012: Game 1 Will Be Especially Critical For L.A. Kings

Since 2002, six of the last nine Stanley Cup champions took at least three days longer to wrap up their conference title than their final opponent. That's the case for the New Jersey Devils this season as they enter a final matchup with the Los Angeles Kings.

Meanwhile, seven of the last nine champions have played at least one extra game in their respective conference final. Again, New Jersey took the Eastern crown in six games while the Kings won the West in five.

One piece of good news for the Kings is that the two exceptions are from 2009 and 2010.

But with that being said, the 2009 Pittsburgh Penguins only needed to wait four days between picking up the Prince of Wales Trophy and dropping the puck against the Detroit Red Wings. The Chicago Blackhawks of the following year had a six-day layoff while the opposing Philadelphia Flyers waited five days.

The Kings will have gone eight days with no authentic game action by the time they commence the cup final in New Jersey on Wednesday.

And although they managed to go a combined 8-1 after a six-day and seven-day layover in the previous rounds, they will need to resist any rust if they are to maintain a realistic shot at the championship.

Los Angeles is still an improbable 8-0 on the road in these playoffs, but the Devils are a league-best 6-2 on their home ice and have won six of their last seven in the Prudential Center.

A split of the first two games will not exactly ring a death knell on the Kings’ underdog run, but if they must settle for that, they will want to be sure to take Game 1.

Relinquishing their road perfection as part of their first impression on the Devils would only make it tougher to claim Game 2 and usurp precious home-ice advantage.

Head coach Darryl Sutter must ensure his players’ legs are thawed out in advance of Wednesday night’s Game 1 faceoff, for a slow start will surely complicate L.A.’s quest.

The Kings’ two previous series openers had rather contrary starts, although both went into the first intermission with a 1-1 deadlock and were eventual Los Angeles victories.

Six days after vanquishing Vancouver, L.A. let the Blues take a 1-0 lead before the first period was half over and then jumped on board at the 16:58 mark.

Trailing the shooting gallery 13-11 after 20 minutes, the Kings would outshoot St. Louis 9-8 and outscore the Blues 1-0 in each of the remaining two stanzas.

A full week after finishing their sweep of the Blues, however, the Kings set the tone for the conference finals by outshooting the Coyotes 17-4 in the first period of Game 1. The only reason the goals were even at 1-1 was because of a fluky, homeward-bound shot by Derek Morris from center ice.

New Jersey will almost inevitably have a say in which of those two L.A. teams surfaces to start the Stanley Cup final. The visitors’ challenge will be to control and match the volume of their opponent’s voice.

The Devils are coming off three consecutive wins against the New York Rangers that each saw them take either a 2-0 or 3-1 lead into the first intermission. And while the Blueshirts twice roared back for the equalizer, veteran stopper Martin Brodeur adamantly refused to authorize a go-ahead goal.

The further along he moves in what could be his final NHL playoff run, the more assertive the veteran is bound to become. And his teammates will likely continue to feed off of Brodeur’s incentive.

For their part, the Kings must preempt that by at least ensuring they are awake, alert and ready to respond.

Given the eight-day interlude, Los Angeles netminder Jonathan Quick will pose a sharp contrast to the Rangers’ overworked goaltender, Henrik Lundqvist. But Quick will be a masked mystery man simply because this is his first Stanley Cup Final and he has not played with many deficits in these playoffs.

Although Los Angeles has come back to win five out of six times when the opposition has scored first, the Kings have yet to concede a multi-goal deficit.

And if an overload of rest proves just as costly for Quick this week as a shortage of it did for Lundqvist last week, the Devils will have little difficulty tossing his team into unfamiliar territory.

Naturally, the same concept applies if New Jersey takes one (let alone both) of the first two contests in the series.