Perhaps the most surprising result to come out of the opening night of the 2012 playoffs was the No. 8 seed Los Angeles Kings and their 4-2 win in Vancouver (well, it probably wasn't all that surprising to those of us that actually picked the Kings to win the series). And not just that they were able to win, taking a 1-0 series lead, but that they were able to control a large portion of the game and really put a lot of pressure on Vancouver's defense, as well as goaltender Roberto Luongo.

The popular consensus coming into this series seemed to be that for Los Angeles to have any sort of a chance it would need Jonathan Quick to basically steal every game, as he had done for the Kings for much of the first half of the season when their offense was completely invisible. The reality, however, is that Los Angeles has been one of the best teams in the NHL over the past month-and-a-half, especially after the addition of Jeff Carter, and they showed why on Wednesday night, firing 39 shots at Roberto Luongo and limiting the high-powered Canucks offense to just 26, only two of which found the back of the net.

The Kings are better than your typical eighth seed, and they showed in Game 1 that they're going to give Vancouver everything the Canucks can handle.

Los Angeles was simply the better team from start to finish.

Goal of the night: Dustin Penner's pinball goal late in the third period proved to be the game-winner for Los Angeles.



Worst play(s) of the night: Nashville's Shea Weber deciding to slam Henrik Zetterberg's head into the glass. After the game was already over.

Of course, we also shouldn't overlook Vancouver's Byron Bitz earning a game-misconduct and a five-minute major penalty for boarding Los Angeles Kyle Clifford late in the second period. Not only did Bitz get himself kicked out of the game, and now has to face the threat of a potential banishment from the long arm of the law that is Brendan Shanahan, it also resulted in the Kings scoring a key power play goal.



Overlooked performance of the night: Claude Giroux of the Philadelphia Flyers. He didn't factor into the scoring for Philadelphia during its 4-3 come-from-behind win in Pittsburgh, but he won over 65 percent of his faceoffs, kept the play moving up the ice in the right direction (he finished with a plus-five Corsi rating) and won four of his five faceoffs in the defensive zone.

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