Kopitar Game 7 overtime winner vs Blackhawks 2014

Lore & Background

The 2013-14 season had already been a statement. The Kings had fought through the Pacific Division and into the playoffs as a team built on grit, defensive structure, and the quiet, relentless excellence of their Slovenian center. By the time they met the Blackhawks in the Western Conference Finals, they had already dispatched formidable opponents, and the entire city had wrapped itself around the team in a way that felt almost new.

Game 7 at Staples Center carried the weight of a franchise that had waited decades for a moment like this. The game was a war—physical, tense, back-and-forth. When the regulation clock expired without a winner, the arena held its breath. Then, in overtime, Kopitar did what he had done so many times that season: he found the seam, he made the play, and he put the puck where it needed to go. The net bulged, the horn blared, and the ice erupted. Players piled on him. The crowd noise was reportedly so deafening that it registered as a minor seismic event in the building.

The Kings would fall to the Rangers in the Cup Final, swept 4-1 in a run that stung deeply. But in the mythology of the organization, the narrative does not end in New York. It ends in that overtime period in Los Angeles, with a number 12 skating through a sea of white and purple, a goal that told the city: you are no longer the expansion afterthought. You are a contender.

In Their Own Story

The ice was slick with a thin film of spray from a dozen faceoffs. Kopitar stood at the blue line, breathing hard, his chest heaving under the white Kings jersey. The scoreboard read 3-3. The clock in the third had ticked to zero, and now there was no clock at all—just the endless white oval and the sound of forty thousand people breathing in unison. He skated back, set his stick, and waited. The puck came around the net. A screen. A rebound. And then, there it was, loose in the slot. He didn't think. He never thought on those. He just redirected, soft, low, through the legs of the goaltender. The puck kissed the back of the net. For a half-second, nothing. Then the horn. Then the world. He dropped his stick. His teammates were already airborne, a tumbling mass of helmets and arms. He looked up at the rafters, at the purple and gold sea, and let out a sound that was half laugh, half sob. Somewhere in the stands, a father was carrying his son on his shoulders. Somewhere in a bar in Ljubljana, a stranger was weeping. And in the Kings' locker room, a coach was already reaching for the phone to call the general manager. The message was simple: we're going to New York.

Reader's Guide

The 2014 Game 7 overtime winner is best understood as a franchise milestone rather than a statistical record. Anže Kopitar scored the decisive goal in a 4-3 overtime victory over the Chicago Blackhawks in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals, played at Staples Center on May 21, 2014.

- **Who:** Anže Kopitar, center, Los Angeles Kings - **When:** May 21, 2014, overtime - **Context:** Kings trailed the series 3-2; this was the season they reached the Cup Final for the first time - **Result:** Kings won 4-3 (OT), advancing to face the New York Rangers - **Franchise significance:** First-ever Stanley Cup Final appearance for the Kings (founded 1979)

In the broader context of Kings playoff history, this goal stands as the high-water mark of the team's first true contender era. Prior to 2014, the Kings had never advanced past the second round. The 2014 run—culminating in a Cup Final berth—represented the ceiling of what the organization had achieved up to that point, and Kopitar's strike is the single image that encapsulates it. It is the goal fans reference when they say, "We almost had it."

Did You Know?

• The 2014 run marked the first time in the Kings' 35-year history that they reached the Stanley Cup Final.
• Anže Kopitar was a regular-season and playoff All-Star that year, cementing his status as one of the NHL's most complete two-way centers.
• The Kings lost the 2014 Stanley Cup Final to the New York Rangers in five games, a sweep that made the Game 7 heroics all the more bittersweet for the fanbase.
• Kopitar's 2014 playoff performance was part of a career that would see him accumulate over 1,000 career points, making him one of the most durable and consistent players in NHL history.