On Tuesday night the Stanley Cup was finally awarded, and after a wild series that saw the New Jersey Devils come from 3-0 down to give the Kings one last scare, Los Angeles took advantage of a five minute boarding penalty to Steve Bernier scoring three goals and clinching the franchise's first ever Stanley Cup. While the big story nationally is the Kings club winning their first Stanley Cup after having great players such as Rob Blake, Luc Robitaille, Wayne Gretzky and Jari Kurri fail to do so, locally the major story is Jarret Stoll getting his first Stanley Cup.
Stoll who has ties throughout the Parkland, being born in Melville and raised in Yorkton, has had a solid NHL career, but has never been the player who gets the recognition of the analysts in the media.
However, Stoll has stepped up his game from his Edmonton days, when he played for an Oilers squad that was also an eighth seeded underdog that made it to the finals in 2006. The Oilers however dug themselves a 3-0 hole and despite a legendary comeback to force a game seven, the Oilers lost to the Carolina Hurricanes leaving Stoll without a title.
Stoll, who was still a solid faceoff specialist with the Oilers, was traded to the Kings in 2008 and continued to fill his role as a solid, but not flashy player. A first overall WHL Bantam Draft selection and Memorial Cup champion, Stoll had experienced success at the major junior level, but with losing the Stanley Cup in a seventh game and being traded to a Kings franchise that wasn't exactly known for winning Stanley Cups, it seemed as if Stoll was destined to be one of the NHL's most underrated players.
Underrated players are the players that teammates and coaches love, but don't have the type of game or type of personality that makes them the guy who has all the endorsements or is the interview during intermission on Hockey Night in Canada. A third line faceoff specialist on mid-level teams like the Oilers and Kings are never going to get the respect they deserve from the TSN panel or on Coaches Corner, no matter how solid of pieces they are to their teams.
The 2012 Los Angeles Kings thrived off of players like Jarret Stoll though, and his high faceoff percentage and solid defensive play became a focal point throughout the playoffs and his series clinching overtime goal on Cory Schneider to send home the league's best Vancouver Canucks in the opening round finally put Stoll in the spotlight his hard work earned.
Once an underrated player gets placed in the spotlight, his hard work and strengths are easier to notice to the casual fan who isn't aware of the minutiae and deepness of the game beyond the goal scoring. Stoll actually scored half the points he tallied in his 2006 run with the Oilers, but drew more than double the praise he received from the media in this year's magic season.
Stoll is a role model for all athletes as he shows that you don't have to be team's most flashy or loudest player to make a name for yourself, but if you play your game to your strengths and be a good team player eventually your recognition and reward will come to you. It was a long overdue journey for a player who shows the work ethic and ideals that the Parkland area likes to associate itself with, but at the end of the day Stoll's hard work and solid play has earned himself a moment in the spotlight, and I'm sure it was worth the wait.
