Kings stand above all L.A. teams

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Over the past five days, the Dodgers and Angels were eliminated from the MLB playoffs after being favored to meet in the first-ever postseason Freeway Series.  USC was knocked out of college football's Top 25 on a Hail Mary at the Coliseum.  UCLA was kicked out of the top 10 by a last-second field goal at the Rose Bowl. The Lakers, coming off their worst season since moving to L.A. in 1960, are pinning their hopes this season on a couple of aging stars who are a combined 76 years old and played in a combined 21 games last season. And for all their current talent, the Clippers have still never made it out of the second round of the playoffs in the history of their star-crossed franchise.

So where does that leave Los Angeles?

Well, I'll let Hall of Famer and the president of business operations for the Los Angeles Kings, Luc Robitaille, give the current state of affairs in L.A.

"Los Angeles is the greatest hockey city in the world!" he said.

Laugh all you want but, really, who are we to argue with a Canadian hockey legend and the highest-scoring left winger in NHL history?

Of course, Robitaille's proclamation to a sold-out crowd at Staples Center before the Kings raised their second Stanley Cup banner in three years was dripping with hometown bias, but it certainly isn't as laughable as it would have been four years ago.

In desperate need of a winner, Los Angeles has hitched its wagon to the Kings and, in the process, has transformed itself into a hockey town. It won't ever be confused with Detroit or Montreal, but the idea of Los Angeles being apathetic about its hockey team is now about as old as a Marty McSorley illegal stick joke.

The truth is the Kings represent Los Angeles better than any current team.

Four months ago the Kings completed a storybook journey to become Stanley Cup champions that may never be duplicated. They became just the fourth team to come back from a 0-3 series deficit, the first team to win three Game 7s in the playoffs -- all on the road no less -- the first team to play 65 playoff games over three seasons and the first to play 26 playoff games in one postseason. And, perhaps most impressively, they played in seven elimination games and went a perfect 7-0.

In a city that has become almost resigned to having its heart broken at the end of games by its biggest stars, the Kings constantly find a way to do the impossible. The old, clichéd L.A. fan who leaves games early is nonexistent at Staples Center when the Kings are playing. Not after the Kings became the first team to come back from a 2-0 deficit in three consecutive postseason games and Alec Martinez became the first player to score the game-winning, series-clinching overtime goal in both the conference and Stanley Cup finals.

Perhaps the most Los Angeles thing about these Kings is that they are always fashionably late when it comes to the regular season. In fact, it's basically an afterthought as long as they get into the postseason.

Kings fans would have loved to celebrate a win over the San Jose Sharks on Wednesday night instead of opening the season with a 4-0 loss, but they know in the long run it won't matter with this team -- or at least they should realize that by now.

Since 1990, only the Pittsburgh Penguins (1991 and 1992) and the Detroit Red Wings (1997 and 1998) have also won two Stanley Cups in three seasons, but you would never know the Kings are one of the best teams of the past 25 years by looking at them during the regular season. The Kings won the Stanley Cup in 2012 as a No. 8 seed, becoming the first 8-seed in North American professional sports to win a championship and just the second to eliminate the first, second and third seeds in the same postseason. Last season, the Kings won the Stanley Cup finals as the sixth seed.

Those Kings teams are the only Stanley Cup champions seeded lower than fifth to win the trophy and just the third team to win despite finishing lower than second in its division.

Sure, the Sharks beat the Kings on Wednesday to start the season, but they have never been able to beat anyone when it matters in the postseason. That's why they have six division banners hanging up at the SAP Center but no Stanley Cup banners. They might have ruined the Kings' banner night, but chances are they won't be able to stop them from raising another one if they face each other in the playoffs again. Even when the Sharks had a 3-0 series lead in last season's first round, the Kings found a way to come back and win.

It's that kind of heart and perseverance that have transformed Los Angeles into a hockey town. Other fans in other cities can disagree, but all they have to do now is look up to the rafters at Staples Center for confirmation.