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In which Dustin Penner, Jeff Carter and Mike Richards edit their NHL narratives (Puck Daddy)

Why are the Los Angeles Kings in the 2012 Stanley Cup Final? Because the two drunk, locker room cancers helped set up a lazy fat-ass for the game-winning goal. At least that's how it would have been framed about eight months ago, when the narratives about Mike Richards, Jeff Carter and Dustin Penner had defined them as players. The first two were banished from the Philadelphia Flyers, ostensibly for cap relief in the pursuit of a No. 1 goaltender (or, failing that, Ilya Bryzgalov) but mostly for a culture change in the dressing room. Penner, meanwhile, was (a) a waste of salary compared to production and (b) out of shape and (c) lazy to the point where his general manager suggested he might be better off playing for the El Cid Lounge in a men's softball league . In overtime of Game 5 in the Western Conference Final on Tuesday night, Richards won the faceoff near the defensive zone. Slava Voynov moved it up the boards, and Penner kept the puck alive in the attacking zone on the forecheck, sending a nifty backhand pass to a streaking Carter. He fired the puck off of Phoenix Coyotes goalie Mike Smith with Richards causing chaos on front of the net, helping to clear the slot for Penner to fire home the rebound over Smith's glove. With that, the Kings were headed to the Cup Final. This trio was maligned and decried for the better part of 2011-12. Yet it was this Dry Island of Misfit Toys that has the Kings four wins away from the first Stanley Cup.

 

Philadelphia Flyers Ask Two Players to Join Their Youth Movement: Fan's Take (Yahoo! Contributor Network)

The Philadelphia Flyers signed 18-year-old enforcer Derek Mathers (right wing) and 20-year-old scorer Andrew Johnston (left wing) to entry-level contracts this week. Mathers was originally selected in the seventh round of the 2011 National Hockey League draft, while Johnston had been an undrafted free agent.

 

What We Learned: Embarrassing LA sports media moments while covering Kings playoff run (Puck Daddy)

Hello, this is a feature that will run through the entire season and aims to recap the weekend's events and boils those events down to one admittedly superficial fact or stupid opinion about each team. Feel free to complain about it. It's possibly the greatest bit of investigative journalism conducted since Woodward and Bernstein brought down Richard Nixon. This exemplary, collective effort of sleuth work is currently ongoing in Los Angeles, Calif., where an entire media market has unearthed the NHL's shocking secret: The city has a professional hockey team. Over the past week or so here at Puck Daddy, we've tried to document every startling discovery made by the intrepid Los Angeles media, like how to properly pronounce Anze Kopitar's name (it's hard because he's from Bosnia or something), the real name of this Drew Doughty character ( it's actually Brad !) and that hockey is in fact not played with a ball, but rather a little piece of rubber known as a "puck." That last one makes me pretty uncomfortable because of the word it rhymes with. ("Duck" — sorry, I just don't trust 'em; they have weird beaks). Just how villainous is this team, operating as a sort of sporting sleeper cell? They got all the way to the Western Conference Finals without one local noticing. That takes real criminal talent. And not only that, but, the NHL had the diabolical idea to hide it right under the Los Angelinos' noses, by having their home games played at the Staples Center. You know, where the Lakers play. Further, they named the team the Kings to intentionally confuse even the savviest media organization into thinking they are the NBA's Sacramento Kings. Astonishingly devious stuff. More twists and turns than the Da Vinci Code, which I've read three times just to make sure I understood it all. The best bit of this journalism on this pressing issue comes, of course, from the city's paper of record, the Los Angeles Times, winner of 44 Pulitzer Prizes since 1942, including three in 2012. It was for that towering beacon of journalistic excellence that columnist Chris Erskine successfully scruted several of the team and sport's most inscrutable mysteries . For instance, that thing I said earlier about the puck (again, yuck… oh and that's another gross word it rhymes with), I learned it from Erskine. Apparently they even freeze the thing. And that's a huge point of concern, because, "The hardest shots can reach 110 mph and tear flesh, crush bone, even kill you if you're not careful." Yikes, you guys! ( Coming Up: Rick Nash to Boston?; Tororella defends Prust; Ryan Suter faces his future; Evegni Malkin is having a pretty good season; why Lundqvist is King; why the Capitals can't win with Ovechkin; the Islanders know how to party; Canucks might keep Luongo; Ryan Miller on the CBA; Flames and Oilers coaching news; and are the Kings in trouble?)

 

Rangers rookie Chris Kreider making it look easy in impressive jump from NCAA title to NHL playoffs (Yahoo! Sports)

Kreider went from big man at Boston College to a rushed-in rookie on a tight-knit Rangers team, but his power-forward skills and quietly confident ways have eased the transition.

 

Inside the Los Angeles Kings Twitter feed, social media sensation of NHL playoffs (Puck Daddy)

How many times has Dewayne Hankins been called "classless" during the 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs? "Yes … oh, gosh, a million times," he said. "It's so funny what people throw around as classless. But it's all in good fun. You're stirring up your fan base." Also funny: That those hockey fans on Twitter don't even know it's Dewayne Hankins who is drawing their ire. "They chirp us. We tweet back. And then they tell us how much they love us," he said. "They think it's the Kings talking to them." Hankins ( @DewayneHankins ) is the director of digital media for the Los Angeles Kings. Along with digital media coordinator Pat Donahue ( @patatack ), they run the @LAKings Twitter feed that's become a sensation during the postseason. The Kings had around 70,000 followers when the playoffs began. Thanks to sarcastic, intentionally outrageous messages mixed with practical information about ticket sales and viewing parties, they're well over 110,000 followers after two rounds. Along with the Columbus Blue Jackets, the Kings have reinvented the way an official feed can be utilized — not just for information, but to develop a unique voice that connects with the fan base, while playfully taunting others. Like, for example, Vancouver Canucks fans, with the tweet that will live in infamy.

 

Richards to stay as Columbus coach permanently (The Associated Press)

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) When Todd Richards took over the woeful Columbus Blue Jackets in January after the firing of coach Scott Arniel, he was also interviewing for the job.

 

Blue Jackets name Richards as coach (AFP)

Todd Richards, who took over as interim coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets midway into this past season, was named the National Hockey League team's coach on Monday by general manager Scott Howson.

 

Blue Jackets keep Richards with two-year contract (The SportsXchange)

The Columbus Blue Jackets are sticking with Todd Richards.

 

Blue Jackets name Todd Richards head coach, because what else were they going to do? (Puck Daddy)

Can a coaching move symbolize both stability and instability? The Columbus Blue Jackets removed the interim tag from coach Todd Richards on Monday, making the former Minnesota Wild bench boss the sixth head coach in franchise history. He took over from Scott Arniel on Jan. 9, and went 18-21-2 under Richards at a time when Rick Nash's future cast a foreboding shadow over nearly every game. [ Related: Dale Hunter steps down as Washington Capitals coach ] From a stability standpoint, it could be argued this was a smart decision. The Jackets showed resiliency late in the season, going 11-8 in March and April. They also showed a cohesion and competitive spirit that was missing at the start of the season, when James Wisniewski's suspension, Jeff Carter's apathy and Steve Mason resembling Sonny Corleone's car at the toll booth. So maybe that's something to build on.

 

What We Learned: What to make of this Washington Capitals season? (Puck Daddy)

Hello, this is a feature that will run through the entire season and aims to recap the weekend's events and boils those events down to one admittedly superficial fact or stupid opinion about each team. Feel free to complain about it. There's been a lot of talk about what this season has meant for the Washington Capitals in the hours leading up to, and then immediately following, their final game of the remarkably eventful 2011-12 season. Wysh had a pretty good recap of the reasons the Capitals felt this little run to a pair of one-goal Game 7s against the Nos. 1 and 2 seeds in the Eastern Conference — both having been heavy favorites — vindicated the Dale Hunter system of everyone playing defense and collapsing to within three inches of the crease, and it's perfectly reasonable for people to feel that way. Certainly, no one expected these Capitals to do much damage in the postseason given that they frittered away a division they were picked to dominate. But the thing that everyone seems to forget is that, again, they were picked to dominate the Southeast, be a superpower in the East and the League at large. If the team tuned out Bruce Boudreau, and it appears they did, then wasn't his replacement, whoever it happened to be, more or less expected to get this far? Therefore, it becomes a question about what changed, and really, what didn't. Let's not forget, Boudreau came in originally and let guys like Alex Semin, Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom and Mike Green have their run of the rink. Two-minute shifts? Sure! Goals aplenty? You bet. But in the end, what did it get them? Bounce-outs, and if you believe the talk, disappointing ones at that. So Boudreau changed the style, focusing more on defense, tethering Ovechkin and Co. to an extent, and … getting the same amount of success. Under each of the two clearly definable Boudreau regimes, the team lost in the conference quarter- and semi-finals. Which is of course notable because the latter is exactly how far Hunter got in his first chance at the tiller, despite doing everything in his power not to: like limiting Ovechkin to fewer than 20 minutes a night in every game in this series save for Saturday's Game 7 and the three-overtime Game 3, in which he played 35:14 — or, if you prefer 17:37 per three periods of play. This therefore vindicates Hunter only as far as it vindicated Boudreau; which, with a roster like this, and given the "choker" label being hung liberally on the former Caps coach this time last year. The philosophy changed radically under Hunter, and worked only as far as it did for Boudreau. Why? ( Coming Up: Team USA, international ass-kickers; getting stupid about Patrick Kane's drinking; Parise's future; Could Brad Stuart return to the Sharks?; Kevin Lowe says Ryan Murray is the top player in this year's draft class; Suter/Weber questions; Pancakes Penner's revenge; Bruins pumped for Dougie Hamilton; Alfredsson retirement watch; Leafs/Penguins trade?; Lundqvist is King; Alex Burrows runs and hugs a goalie; and Winnipeg Jets fans are burning Coyotes jerseys.)