{"id":755721,"date":"2026-04-27T02:52:26","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T02:52:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/755721\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T02:52:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T02:52:26","slug":"anze-kopitars-nhl-career-ends-in-kings-game-4-loss-to-avalanche","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/755721\/","title":{"rendered":"Anze Kopitar’s NHL career ends in Kings’ Game 4 loss to Avalanche"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Seven times in the past 11 seasons the Kings<\/a> have advanced to the Stanley Cup playoffs, only to leave after the first round.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve changed coaches five times, general managers twice, even the team captains have changed over that span. But the results have not.<\/p>\n

The latest flameout came Sunday when the Colorado Avalanche rode two goals from Nathan MacKinnon<\/a> and goals from Cale Makar<\/a>, Nicolas Roy<\/a> and Devon Toews<\/a> to a 5-1 win<\/a> and a sweep of the first-round playoff series.<\/p>\n

\"Kings <\/p>\n

Kings captain Anze Kopitar acknowledges the crowd after playing in his final NHL game Sunday.<\/p>\n

Joel Edmundson<\/a> had the lone goal for the Kings.<\/p>\n

And with the end of the season comes the end of an era because it marked the final game Anze Kopitar<\/a>\u2019s spectacular 20-year career.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve never experienced that emotion,\u201d Kopitar said of leaving the ice for the last time. \u201dThere\u2019s always a next year. Now it\u2019s done. So it\u2019s hard to comprehend.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been one hell of a ride for 20 years. The good, the bad and the ugly. Not the way we wanted to go out, but it happened, and we got to live with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kopitar, who played his entire career with the Kings, announced in September that this would be his last season and he heads into retirement as the franchise record-holder in games (1,521), points (1,316) and assists (864). He\u2019s third all time in goals (452) and was also the leader \u2014 and leading scorer \u2014 on the Kings\u2019 two Stanley Cup championship teams in 2012 and 2014.<\/p>\n

But the numbers don\u2019t tell the whole story.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way he treats people,\u201d interim coach D.J. Smith said of what stands most for him about Kopitar. \u201cHe treats the guys in the back that no one sees the exact same as his teammates. No one\u2019s bigger than the team and Kopi showed that every single day. Everyone was the same. He knows everyone\u2019s kids names.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou see these things that go by the wayside, that star players in sports today, a lot of them don\u2019t do anymore. Kopi\u2019s a throwback and a classy, classy human being.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Kings <\/p>\n

Kings center Anze Kopitar warms up before Game 4 against the Colorado Avalanche on Sunday at Crypto.com Arena.<\/p>\n

As the clock ticked down on the final seconds of Kopitar\u2019s career, the sold-out crowd at Crypto.com Arena serenaded him with a chant of \u201cThank you, Kopi!\u201d Following the game, Avalanche players lined up to shake his hand, the four officials stood off to the side and applauded him and his Kings teammates banged their sticks on the ice in rhythmic salute.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ultimate pro,\u201d Colorado captain Gabriel Landeskog said. \u201cHe commands so, so much respect for how he plays the game, how he represents himself and the team. He plays the game the right way.\u201d<\/p>\n

With Kopitar\u2019s departure, defenseman Drew Doughty<\/a> becomes not just the last holdover from the Stanley Cup teams, but the last man to play in a postseason series the Kings won.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s old,\u201d he said of the seven straight first-round postseason losses. \u201cObviously we want more and wanted to win a playoff series or two. I don\u2019t have any answers as to why it\u2019s not happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Kings <\/p>\n

Kings captain Anze Kopitar stands on the ice during the national anthem before Game 4 against the Colorado Avalanche.<\/p>\n

If anything, the Kings are going backward because they won a game, at least, in their last five playoffs appearances. Against the Avalanche they not only failed to win, they led just once, for three minutes and 21 seconds late in Game 2.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, Colorado went in front to stay on a power-play goal from MacKinnon with less than seven minutes left in the first period. It was the first score of the series for MacKinnon, who led the NHL with 53 goals during the regular season.<\/p>\n

Makar doubled the lead 5:48 into the second period. The Kings rallied briefly, cutting the deficit in half on Edmundson\u2019s goal about eight minutes later. But in the third period three unanswered Colorado goals put the game and series away. When MacKinnon capped the scoring on an empty-netter with 5:38 to play, it brought an early end to another disappointing postseason for the Kings while starting another long offseason, one the team enters with more questions than answers.<\/p>\n

\"Kings <\/p>\n

Kings defenseman Mikey Anderson, left, battles Colorado forward Gabriel Landeskog for the puck in Game 4 of their first-round playoff series Sunday at Crypto.com Arena.<\/p>\n

The first issue general manager Ken Holland will have to address is the fate of Smith, who replaced Jim Hiller behind the bench with 23 games to go and guided the Kings into the playoffs, only to see them fall flat. Is that enough to remove the interim tag from his title and make him the permanent head coach?<\/p>\n

Offensively, forward Adrian Kempe<\/a> was the only player to top 30 goals and 70 points for the Kings \u2014 winger Artemi Panarin<\/a> had 84 points, but most of those came with the New York Rangers before the February trade that sent him to L.A. And the date for forward Kevin Fiala<\/a>\u2019s return from multiple fractures in left leg remains uncertain.<\/p>\n

The Kings may also have problems in goal where journeyman Anton Forsberg<\/a>, 33, played brilliantly during the postseason but has averaged fewer than 21 starts a season during his 11-year career. And Darcy Kuemper<\/a>, who lost the starting job after the Olympic break, posted the second-worst save percentage (.891) and fourth-highest goals-against average (2.78) of his career. Kuemper turns 36 next month.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Kings captain Anze Kopitar plays his final NHL shift in Game 4 against the Colorado Avalanche.<\/p>\n

What Holland won\u2019t be able to do is replace the irreplaceable Kopitar, who is eager to get started on his new job as a full-time dad to 11-year-old daughter Ne\u017ea, a budding figure skater, and Jakob, his 9-year-old hockey-playing son.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are two reasons that I\u2019m really going to enjoy next year,\u201d said Kopitar, who shared the dais for a postgame news conference with his children. \u201cIt\u2019s very bittersweet, for sure. There\u2019s going to be some tears, but that\u2019s the way the life goes, right? It\u2019s a circle.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re away and you\u2019re missing birthdays and you\u2019re missing competitions and hockey games. Now they get to wake up in the morning and see me there, which is what they deserve. They\u2019ve been, you know, 11 years, nine years with a so-called part-time dad. Now they get full time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Kings <\/p>\n

Kings captain Anze Kopitar raises the Stanley Cup as he floats across Lake Bled in Slovenia with family and friends in 2012.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Seven times in the past 11 seasons the Kings have advanced to the Stanley Cup playoffs, only to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":755722,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5123],"tags":[106649,4830,310863,1582,276,4439,161639,1910,42155,21132,2961,224,5337,5948,69954,5950,5613,3007,6620,310864],"class_list":["post-755721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-anze-kopitar","tag-avalanche","tag-best-of-seven-series","tag-ca","tag-california","tag-colorado","tag-final-minute","tag-game","tag-goal","tag-king","tag-la","tag-los-angeles","tag-losangeles","tag-loss","tag-nathan-mackinnon","tag-season","tag-second","tag-team","tag-time","tag-two-minute-misconduct"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116474409814330811","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755721\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/755722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}