Hard to believe it took Anze Kopitar this long to get his first career hat trick. For all the bitching and moaning that people did about his decreased production last season, he’s more than made up with it the first ten games of 2009-10. Kopi’s first goal of the night will be highlight reel material for a very long time (I have the 3AM edition of NHL On the Fly set to DVR and if this doesn’t make Ice Pix, hell if it doesn’t make Ice Pix for the WEEK, the MONTH or the entire SEASON, I’m calling complete and utter BS!). I might be biased but it gets my early vote for goal of the year. Paging Stephane Robidas and Alex Auld: We finally found your jocks! Kopitar’s second goal was nearly as impressive, as he powered out of the corner and caught Alex Auld cheating off the stick side post. Third one was a knuckleball backhand that you couldn’t script in Hollywood. His next shift following the hat trick, Kopi gets the puck right in the slot and instead of shooting (and probably scoring) he does the unselfish thing and dishes the puck to Simmonds, who fires a harmless bad angle shot at Auld. Bottom line, Kopitar is a bona fide NHL superstar. Anybody who says they’d rather have Ryan Getzlaf on their team is either delusional or lying enough to win a jousting contest with Pinocchio. Jim Fox said it in tonight’s broadcast more than once – Kopitar is playing like the best centerman in the NHL right now. Oh, and he’s currently tied with a guy named Ovechkin for the league scoring lead. I’m not going to predict that Kopi is going to win a scoring title – but he’s doing a great job of supporting my prediction that he’ll near or eclipse the 100 point mark. All this from a guy that a lot of hockey fans, hell, a lot of KINGS’ fans, didn’t think was a true number one center. Hope that crow tastes good!

You can credit Kopitar’s new linemates with being responsible for this, or you can credit his much improved conditioning, or maybe it’s just the pancakes. Truth is it’s probably a little bit of all that. One thing is undeniable – Anze Kopitar is for real.

Wayne Simmonds looked good on the top line tonight, replacing the injured Justin Williams (who suffered a lower body injury during today’s pregame skate and is not expected to be out long). Simmonds’ goal was a thing of beauty too. You knew the guy had some offensive skill, but who knew he had hands like that? I think Simmonds is going to be a very good two way forward in the NHL for a long time, but that move makes one wonder if maybe he isn’t fit for a top-6 type role?

The guy who made the beautiful pass to Simmonds on that goal? That was Alexander Frolov, returning from the land of the healthy scratch. Frolov had an excellent game tonight – here’s to hoping Terry Murray’s motivational plan worked.

Michal Handzus has developed into a pretty damn good checking centerman in LA, but one thing I think people overlook is how clutch he is. 3 of Handzus’ 4 goals this season have been game winners. Any team could use about 10 guys with that kind of a quality goal ratio. He’s also not bad in the faceoff circle. As much as we all cringed every time he hopped the boards in his first season as a King, I say HAIL ZUS’! I want this guy on my team, even if he is overpaid for a third (now second) line center.

The Kings obviously aren’t having trouble scoring goals at home. Preventing them has definitely looked like an issue. If you’d have told me this Summer that the Kings biggest issues would be defensive play and goaltending I’d have called you crazy. A team that was good defensively last year and added one Rob Scuderi to the backline corps has looked like the Jeckyll and Hyde defense, and it seems like you don’t know what you’re going to get. The good news is, nobody in their right mind thinks Denis Gauthier is better than Rob Scuderi, which means it’s a correctable problem. The penalty kill has gotten better, which is a good thing. Now if we could just stop committing costly turnovers and missing defensive assignments. The first two games of the last road trip, the Kings kept it simple defensively and were very good. With the exception of Monday night in Dallas, every game since it seems like guys are trying to fix what wasn’t broken and it’s not working out very well. It’s nice that the team can score, but you shouldn’t have to score 5 or 6 goals every time you’re at home to win. That is epic defensive fail.

Some of that responsibility falls on the shoulders of Jon Quick, who was not terribly sharp tonight. The first Dallas goal was a hell of a shot, but the three after that are saves that have to be made. Quick, much like the rest of the Kings’ team defensively, is trying to do too much and getting away with what gave us fans a little hope in the first place. Again, it’s correctible. I admire that Terry Murray (who was VERY critical of Quick at tonight’s press conference) is going to stick with Quick and let him work through it. Quick should be motivated to get back in gear too – Jonathan Bernier is doing a little dominating in the AHL right now and he is waiting with baded breath for a chance to take Quick’s job. For the Kings, this is a quality problem to have, but Quick absolutely has to be better. It’s been a blessing that the Kings have won 2, maybe 3 home games already this season where they got a less than stellar goaltending, but as the season wears along, that isn’t going to cut it. It’s very soon going to be make or break time.

So, thought it’s nice to get two points, and it’s nicer knowing you just won two straight over a division opponent, but there’s lots of work yet to be done.

Kings play in Phoenix Saturday night. Now might be a good time to stock up on antidepressants since we tend to play our worst hockey against the Coyotes in recent years.

-JS