Stanley Cup 2012: Extended Rest Will Cool Off Scorching LA Kings

Why are the Los Angeles Kings favored in this series?

The No. 8 seed steamrolled through the Western Conference and will be entering the Stanley Cup Finals against the sixth-seeded New Jersey Devils incredibly rested.

Maybe too rested.

Since sweeping the St. Louis Blues back on May 6^th, the Kings will have played just five games prior to stepping onto the ice this Wednesday (May 30^th)—a stretch that even the most seasoned veteran teams would struggle with.

Rust will be a factor for the Kings, who will have had a full week off before Game 1, which means there has been plenty of time to think about the moment—to think about the importance of the next two weeks and how drastically different their careers could become.

When you are young team, like the Kings, that is way ahead of schedule on making it this far in the postseason...thinking isn’t good.

Playoff hockey is all about momentum, and that’s just what the Devils have going into this series.

After being on the brink of elimination before beating the Florida Panthers in seven games, the veteran Devils have slowly gained more and more momentum as the playoffs have gone on. They enter the finals after winning three straight against the New York Rangers, the team that most experts believed would cruise to the championship.

They are battled-tested and have gotten into a serious groove at the perfect time.

What compounds the veteran team versus young team problem is that the first two games are in New Jersey. The crowd is going to be at a piercing pitch, and if the Kings fall behind early, the nerves and sense of the moment are going to catch up to them.

Martin Brodeur has appeared in 187 playoffs games, owns three Stanley Cup titles and is sporting a .923 save percentage in the playoffs. What might be even more incredible are the four assists he has dished out in the playoffs, a record in the postseason.

But what makes the Devils so dangerous is their versatility. They have received goals from 15 different players in the playoffs. Wingers Ilya Kovalchuk, Zach Parise and centerman Travis Zajac lead the team with seven goals apiece. However, this postseason run has been a complete team effort.

The Kings have gone 12-2 in the playoffs over the top three seeds (Vancouver, St. Louis and Phoenix) and are 8-0 on the road. Can’t take anything away from that.

Goalie Jonathan Quick has compiled a .946 save percentage, a 1.54 GAA and two shutouts in the playoffs. No doubt he has been the MVP of the playoffs thus far.

But what happens when he lets that first soft goal get by? What happens when his team isn’t playing with the lead?

One of the beautiful things about the two-month duration of the NHL postseason is a team’s ability to fight through adversity and become a stronger team mentality because of it. The Devils have faced plenty of adversity. They have been on the brink of elimination and have had to fight back from 1-0 series deficits in two of the three series that they ended up winning.

The Kings, though, have cruised.

While that is certainly a testament to how dominant this team has been in the postseason, everything changes in the Stanley Cup Finals.

This is a different type of pressure, one the vast majority of the Kings have yet to feel. Nobody knows what will happen if the Kings lose Game 1.

While there certainly isn’t a tremendous difference in talent between the two clubs, I’m going with the more experienced team that has already faced extreme adversity and emerged from it victorious. The team that doesn’t have to worry about being rusty. The team with the home ice advantage.  

Prediction: Devils in six

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