As longtime readers of this blog probably know, TWIK is a weekly recap column of the entire Pacific division that is typically posted every Monday. Yesterday I did not post it out of both respect for the tragic real life Voynov situation and my own personal feeling of queasiness every time I tried to really think or focus on hockey (and more specifically the Kings).
To be quite honest, that queasiness has yet to really subside today; it still feels vaguely inappropriate and gross to write about the hockey games played by the Kings last week as if it’s the most important thing going on right now. But given that I didn’t miss a single week of the season last year, I do want to at least get something up for the week. And I think it’s important to note in the archives that this horrible week did indeed happen, rather than trying to white wash it out of the archives.
So what I’m going to do is this: for the usual features in TWIK, I’m going to offer no analysis or commentary on the games/standings/upcoming schedule/etc. The information will be there for the archives and this snapshot in time, but I just don’t feel comfortable talking about hockey games and upcoming opponents like they’re important, at least not yet. And before we get into all that, we’ll talk about what was obviously the most important thing from the past 8 days in the Kings world, one more time.
By now you should know about the situation with Slava Voynov. If you missed any of it, our article from yesterday is a great place to start. Langluy also had another detailed comment in the comments section that I highly recommend reading. As Eric said earlier, we as a staff appreciate that things largely stayed under control in those comments sections, despite some minor issues. You may not always agree with our decisions, tone, or even our outlook in general, but hopefully you can respect the fact that everything we do is with the best interests of the community in mind. The comments we got from a variety of people, both Kings fans and not, who praised our handling of it and the welcoming space we created really meant a lot to us, so thanks a lot for that.
For more on the Voynov situation, you can also check out last night’s Jewelcast, when Langluy, Nick, and I discussed it at length. There were some technical difficulties for about the first five or six minutes of the show, but once you get past there things were relatively smooth for the rest of it. I also recommend reading the excellent post from Stace (of our sister blog Battle of California), which you may have seen already since we’ve had it linked off the front page.
My final thoughts before I try to awkwardly move on: I want everyone to remember how they felt yesterday when the news first broke. I want you to remember that visceral disgust, that feeling of betrayal from a man who you (foolishly, and I’m certainly guilty of it too) thought you knew, and I want you to carry that forward with you. While nothing I’m saying here should in any way be taken as making excuses or apologizing for Slava, I want you to recognize that what happened yesterday was systematic of the unrealistic, unfair, and flat-out disgusting ways Western society treat gender. Domestic violence is but one symptom of a patriarchal society that punishes the very act of being female.
Luckily for the vast majority of us, domestic violence is safely outside of our “bubble” and is not something we have to deal with every day, but it’s happening around us all the time even if we don’t notice it. If we want it and the many other problems caused by gender inequality to get better, we have to start by first and foremost making changes in our own daily lives. This goes double for the men reading since we’re the ones who are given that privilege from the start- and to be clear, this is not to say it’s your fault or that you did anything wrong by simply having that privilege, because you had no choice in the matter and you did not ask for it. That I feel is something many people get wrong about the concept of privilege in the first place: no one is ever saying that you are personally to blame for any form of privilege (be it race, gender, orientation, able, cis, etc. etc.), because those privileges were built into the system of Western civilization since long before you were ever born. What you are at fault for is if you choose to ignore or, worse, actively try to combat attempts to change the system that gives you those privileges.
You can be a part of that fight in your daily life, even just by doing small but important things. If you’re in a group of male friends and one or more of them think it’s appropriate to use crude euphemisms for the female sexual organ as an insult, you can tell them to cut it the fuck out. If you’re at work and you hear a female co-worker being badmouthed by others in a highly gendered way (for example, “she’s such a bitch” tends to be some kind of code-worded way of saying “she’s too aggressive for a woman”, where as aggressive men in the work force tend to get promoted instead of gossiped about), you can challenge their perceptions and ask them why they don’t feel similarly about their male co-workers. You can demand a political process where women’s health isn’t used as a “get out the vote” issue, and refuse to support the politicians who do it.
These are all small things that you, as a person, can do to try and combat the system that we have. I know not all of this is probably what you want to see from a hockey blog, but I feel it’s important to discuss why we have found ourselves in our current situation. What Voynov did yesterday was a deeply tragic event, but it was just one brief instance of a much larger problem happening to make contact with our very tiny hockey bubble. I hope you’ll remember how you felt yesterday and realize that, even though it’s unlikely we’ll see the problems of sexism and misogyny make contact with our bubble in such a direct and unavoidable way again anytime soon, the problems will still continue to exist. You always have a choice between confronting these problems or simply turning away, and I hope you’ll choose the former rather than the latter.
Just keep in mind that you’re always going to get push back from people who really, really like the system the way it is. I also feel the need to say that everything I’ve written above reflects my own personal feelings and should not be taken to represent the entire editorial staff at Jewels, and obviously not SB Nation. If you have a major disagreement, masudoreiidx at gmail. Or there’s always my twitter. Plenty of ways to reach me. But please, do not turn the comments into a shitshow. Thank you.
Anyway. With all that said, I suppose we’ll try our best to talk about some hockey now.
This Week in Games
(here’s all the games involving the Pacific Division from this past week. we’ll talk about the LA Kings’ games in great detail, while the rest will mostly just be scores, unless there’s something that really stood out about them. you’ll also get links to Eric’s awesome recaps which will expand on everything I’m saying in much greater detail if you missed any of them.)
Monday, October 13th
–Anaheim Ducks 5, Buffalo Sabres 1
Tuesday, October 14th
–Anaheim Ducks 4, Philadelphia Flyers 3 (SO)
–San Jose Sharks 6, Washington Capitals 5 (SO)
–Calgary Flames 3, Nashville Predators 2 (SO)
–Los Angeles Kings 6, Edmonton Oilers 1: (recap) (gamethread)
Wednesday, October 15th
–Calgary Flames 2, Chicago Blackhawks 1 (OT)
–Arizona Coyotes 7, Edmonton Oilers 4
Thursday, October 16th
-New York Islanders 4, San Jose Sharks 3 (SO)
–Los Angeles Kings 1, St. Louis Blues 0 (SO): (recap) (gamethread)
Friday, October 17th
-Columbus Blue Jackets 3, Calgary Flames 2
–Vancouver Canucks 2, Edmonton Oilers 0
–Anaheim Ducks 2, Minnesota Wild 1
Saturday, October 18th
–San Jose Sharks 4, New Jersey Devils 2
-St. Louis Blues 6, Arizona Coyotes 1
-Tampa Bay Lightning 4, Vancouver Canucks 1
Sunday, October 19th
–Los Angeles Kings 2, Minnesota Wild 1: (recap) (gamethread)
-New York Rangers 4, San Jose Sharks 0
–Calgary Flames 4, Winnipeg Jets 1
–Anaheim Ducks 3, St. Louis Blues 0
Monday, October 20th
–Edmonton Oilers 3, Tampa Bay Lightning 2
This Week in Standings
| Team | GP | W | L | OTL | Points | ROW | GF | GA | Diff | Home | Away | Last Week |
| 1. Anaheim | 6 | 5 | 1 | 0 | 10 | 4 | 21 | 13 | +8 | 2-0-0 | 3-1-0 | 4-0-0 |
| 2. Los Angeles | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 9 | 3 | 15 | 10 | +5 | 4-1-0 | 0-0-1 | 3-0-0 |
| 3. San Jose | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 9 | 3 | 20 | 15 | +5 | 1-0-0 | 3-1-1 | 2-1-1 |
| 4. Calgary | 7 | 4 | 3 | 0 | 8 | 3 | 19 | 17 | +2 | 0-1-0 | 4-2-0 | 3-1-0 |
| 5. Vancouver | 4 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 6 | 2 | 13 | 10 | +3 | 1-1-0 | 2-0-0 | 1-1-0 |
| 6. Arizona | 4 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 2 | 13 | 18 | -5 | 2-2-0 | 0-0-0 | 1-1-0 |
| 7. Edmonton | 6 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 14 | 27 | -13 | 1-2-0 | 0-2-1 | 1-3-0 |
As a quick aside, I have no idea why the official NHL standings list the Kings ahead of the Sharks. They both have played the same number of games and have the same number of ROWs, so the next tiebreaker should be points in games played against each other, and obviously the Sharks would lead that category based on their win in the season opener. But whatever, maybe I’m missing something here or maybe the NHL website people like trolling Sharks fans, so I’m going with their version.
This Week in #fancystats
(all stats are total attempts, not percentages. thanks to extra skater war-on-ice. also I regret that Voynov’s name appears here a couple of times, in the interest of factual accuracy. just wanted to warn you.)
Kings 6, Oilers 1
Corsi: Oilers 53-Kings 45 (overall), Oilers 45-Kings 38 (5v5), Kings 4-Oilers 2 (5v5 close), Kings 3-Oilers 2 (5v5 tied)
Fenwick: Oilers 41-Kings 39 (overall), Oilers 36-Kings 32 (5v5), Kings 4-Oilers 2 (5v5 close), Kings 3-Oilers 2 (5v5 tied)
LA Indv. Player Corsi 5v5– Best: Pearson (+4), Toffoli/Carter (tied, +3). Worst: Stoll (-8), King (-7), Brown (-6)
EDM Indv. Player Corsi 5v5– Best: Nurse (+9), Perron (+6), Yakimov/Arcobello/Schultz/Joensuu (tied, +3). Worst: Nikitin (-4), Acton/Gordon (tied, -1)
Kings 1, Blues 0 (SO)
Corsi: Blues 74-Kings 49 (overall), Blues 53-Kings 33 (5v5, 5v5 close, & 5v5 tied)
Fenwick: Blues 56-Kings 37 (overall), Blues 39-Kings 26 (5v5, 5v5 close, & 5v5 tied)
LA Indv. Player Corsi 5v5– Best: Kopitar (+2), Pearson/Toffoli (tied, -1). Worst: Clifford (-11), Voynov/Carter/Regehr (tied, -9)
STL Indv. Player Corsi 5v5– Best: Tarasenko/Stastny (tied, +16), Pietrangelo/Steen (tied, +12). Worst: Backes (-2), Berglund (even), Ott (+1)
Kings 2, Wild 1
Corsi: Wild 70-Kings 31 (overall), Wild 45-Kings 26 (5v5), Wild 32-Kings 19 (5v5 close), Wild 12-Kings 6 (5v5 tied)
Fenwick: Wild 58-Kings 24 (overall), Wild 39-Kings 20 (5v5), Wild 29-Kings 14 (5v5 close), Wild 12-Kings 5 (5v5 tied)
LA Indv. Player Corsi 5v5– Best: Kopitar (+2), Toffoli (even), Voynov/Regehr (-1). Worst: Brown (-16), Greene (-14), Martinez (-12)
Next Week in the Pacific
(this is exactly what it sounds like: the next week’s schedule for all 7 Pacific Division teams. all times are pacific because, um, duh.)
| Team | 10/20 | 10/21 | 10/22 | 10/23 | 10/24 | 10/25 | 10/26 |
| LA | – | – | – | vs.BUF (7:30) | – | – | vs.CBJ (1:00) |
| ANA | – | – | vs.BUF (7:30) | – | vs.CBJ (7:00) | – | vs.SJ (5:00) |
| SJ | – | @BOS (4:00) | – | vs.CBJ (7:30) | – | vs.BUF (1:00) | @ANA (5:00) |
| CGY | – | vs.TB (6:00) | – | vs.CAR (6:00) | – | vs.WSH (7:00) | – |
| VAN | – | @DAL (5:30) | – | @STL (5:00) | @COL (6:00) | – | vs.WSH (6:30) |
| ARI | – | @NSH (5:00) | – | @MIN (5:00) | – | vs.FLA (6:00) | – |
| EDM | vs.TB (W 3-2) | – | vs.WSH (6:30) | – | vs.CAR (6:30) | – | – |
That’s all I’ve got for you this week folks. Here’s to better times ahead. It’s tough to see how they can get much worse than the past 24 hours, at the very least. But one more time, thanks to all of the great members of our community who did the absolute best they possibly could with an extremely horrible situation. Much love to you all.