Lalaland loopy over suddenly-trendy Kings

LOS ANGELES -- Mason Brown has been wearing his Los Angeles Kings jersey every day for about two weeks now. He doesn't even take it off when he goes to school.

And Kings captain Dustin Brown's 3-year-old son isn't the only crazy hockey fan in Southern California these days.

Nineteen years after Wayne Gretzky and Luc Robitaille turned Hollywood into a hockey town, Mason's dad and goalie Jonathan Quick are doing it again.

The eighth-seeded Kings are the first team in the conference finals after a stunning nine-game evisceration of Vancouver and St. Louis, the West's top two teams. Buzz is building all around town for the Kings, who are halfway to hoisting the Stanley Cup for the first time in franchise history.

"I think everyone is pretty excited right now," Brown said Monday while spending a rare day off with his family.

Los Angeles' confluence of sports and entertainment is firmly behind the Kings. Although they can't match the Lakers for celebrity magnetism, they regularly get a wide variety of stars in their stands ranging from Tom Hanks and Kurt Russell to Rob Zombie and Alyssa Milano.

Lakers greats Magic Johnson and Kobe Bryant, Dodgers stars Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier, and Los Angeles Galaxy midfielder Landon Donovan all appeared in promotional videos to pump up the Kings' crowd during the second round. South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone frequently whip out short animations for the Staples Center scoreboard in which Cartman and his buddies taunt the Kings' opponents -- even running over Vancouver's Green Men with a Zamboni in the first round.

The Stanley Cup itself also spent time in Hollywood in recent weeks, making visits to the sets of Glee and Bones for photos with hockey-loving actors Cory Monteith and David Boreanaz, among others.

The Kings are the reason for this puck frenzy: They're just the second team in club history to win two series in the same post-season, and they're the first to sweep a best-of-seven series. Los Angeles is the first No. 8 seed to beat the top two seeds in the same playoffs, and just the third No. 8 seed ever to get beyond the second round.

Los Angeles has advanced this far in the post-season only once before in 44 seasons since the club joined the NHL in the Second Six expansion in 1967. Gretzky's best team reached the 1993 Stanley Cup finals before losing to Montreal, and the Kings had won just one playoff series since.

Their roster is a balanced mix of homegrown talent and imported veterans with lengthy playoff histories, and they've meshed together in a near-flawless effort through the first month of the post-season.

"It's been a long haul, and we've been through a lot," said fourth-year King Jarret Stoll. "There are guys who have been here even longer than me, and we've been through two first-round exits, some great regular seasons, and building something special here."

-- The Associated Press

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 8, 2012 $sourceSection0