The Kings have been up and down this season, suffered through goal-less droughts to multiple stars, a coach firing, and a dead last ranked offense.

As we enter the second half of the 82-game season, let's look back at who was an A, who was an F, and everything in between.

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First there was skier Lindsey Vonn, who Tebowed after winning a race. Then there was the CBS NFL Today group Tebowing after the Broncos defeated the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday. 

Now, LA Kings defenseman Jack Johnson is the latest athlete to celebrate an accomplishment like the Denver Broncos quarterback, Tim Tebow. 

The Washington Post caught up with Johnson after the Kings' 5-2 victory over the Capitals on Monday night, to ask about why he celebrated his goal by dropping to one knee.

Sunday afternoon with friends from Michigan when Tim Tebow led his team to yet another improbable victory, this time in overtime. It was at that point the Los Angeles Kings defenseman got a challenge.

After the game, they said, "If you score, would you Tebow for us?" I said, "Sure, deal."

So, as you can see in the video, Johnson gets a pass in the slot, then rips a wrist shot pass Capitals goalie Thomas Vokoun. He then proceeds to live up to his friends’ request.  

However, the Capitals players were not happy about Johnson’s celebration. Caps defenseman Karl Alzner said after the game, “I understand he’s just trying to be funny, but still it’s kind of a stupid celebration. It’s like those teams in the world junior riding their stick giving high-fives across the bench.” 

The goal broke Johnson out of a long scoring drought, so he deserved to celebrate the way he did. If Alzner is going to get mad at anyone, it should be at Vokoun for allowing in such a soft goal. 

However, this Tebowing craze doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon. With the NHL All-Star Game coming up soon, it should be interesting to see how many All-Stars Tebow as a celebration during the skills competition. 

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Rich Hammond of LA Kings Insider had these quotes from Dustin Penner in a blog entry.

“Not bad. Better than yesterday. I woke up fine, sat down to eat and it locked right up. It never happened to me before. I couldn’t stand up. I was probably at the third stage of evolution. So my wife helped me get dressed, and then I drove to the rink here, to hope they could do some magic and get it opened up. Kinger [trainer Chris Kingsley] just looked at me and said, `Go home.’ So I got some treatment and went home.

 “Apparently it’s one of those mysterious things, where you can throw it out (from) sneezing. I just leaned over to dip into some delicious pancakes that my wife made. It’s just like it [the pain] wraps around you and squeezes. … So it was disappointing. Hopefully it’s just an isolated incident, and not something that’s going to become chronic.”

There really isn't much to say in this situation. Dustin Penner seems to get injured all the time. I have a feeling he is going to never live this one down. I wonder how much ribbing he is going to get from the players in the locker room over this injury.

Penner is set to become a free agent this offseason and I have a feeling that this won't help him in any way. If Penner gets injured from just eating pancakes, how can a team invest money to have him play a whole 82-game season.

Tom Urtz, Jr. is an NHL featured columnist. For NHL news, updates and alerts about players:

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They just recently broke a double-digit streak of scoring two goals or less per game; they have fired their coach, and yet they still remain in the playoff race.

Sitting in ninth place with 41 points, can the Kings make the playoffs while being one of the lowest scoring teams in the NHL?

Or are they just lucky that they're tied with Dallas for eighth place in the Western Conference?

Former head coach Terry Murray preached strict defense with his system. This was dubbed by many as the reason the Kings could not score.

With Murray’s system, the Kings cycled the puck down-low and looked to get a goal from the blue line.

If they cannot score goals under new head coach Darryl Sutter and are forced to rely on goaltender Jonathan Quick, chances are they will not make the playoffs.

Jonathan Quick has carried the team in the first part of the season with five shutouts, but with the firepower the Kings boast up front, he should not have to be relied upon much longer.

The lines get shuffled every now and then, but LA’s top-six usually includes Anze Kopitar, Mike Richards, Dustin Penner, Dustin Brown, Simon Gagne and Justin Williams.

On paper, that would be one of the top forward groups in the league.

Kopitar and Richards are two of the top young centres in the league, and Gagne is a former 40-goal scorer. Brown, Williams and Penner have all potted 30 goals in a season before.

The only player in that bunch that has been able to bulge the twine on a consistent basis is Mike Richards with 13 goals in 29 games.

Even Anze Kopitar, the team’s leading point-producer, has not potted a goal in 16 games.

If Kopitar and the Kings can find their way under new head coach Darryl Sutter, the playoffs will be in reach.

As solid as Quick has been this season, the Kings will not be competing in the playoffs unless they find a way to produce more offense.

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You can attribute their poor play to poor coaching, but that is only part of the story.

Many of the Kings have had poor starts to the season. Let’s take a look at four Kings that need to step up their play.

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Lombardi’s job may be on the line if he fails to get the Kings into the playoffs this season, so you can bet he will do whatever he can to add some firepower to his lineup.

The Kings currently rank dead last in the NHL in goals for and if that does not change under new head coach Darryl Sutter, changes will need to be made to make a push for the playoffs.

Let’s look at four players who could help the Kings move into a playoff spot.

The following trade scenarios are not based on any internet rumors; they are just possible trade targets that could help the Kings.

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But with the departure of Terry Murray and the coming of Darryl Sutter, things can only get better in my own personal opinion.

Sometimes coaching changes can really spur teams on and change the direction they are going, (Hitchcock), but they can also have either a negative effect, or an unchanged effect exposing deeper issues on the team. (Boudreau, Hunter)

For the Los Angeles Kings sake, I hope it is the former. But either way—here are three things the Kings, and Kings fans can expect to see with Sutter coming on board.

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The Kings have posted a record of 14-13-4 on the season, but despite their mediocre start to the season, it is not all bad news for the team that was supposed to contend for the Stanley Cup.

The list of players having a poor season is much longer than the list of players having a fine season for the Kings. Nevertheless, let’s look at three players who have played well in LA.

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The team that was supposed to contend for the Stanley Cup now sits at 12th in their conference and has lost five straight games.

The players cannot score, the coach has been fired, but if there was one area that has not been a disappointment, it is the play of Jonathan Quick.

As bad as things have been for the Kings, if not for Jonathan Quick, things would be much worse.

Coming off two straight seasons with more than 30 wins, Quick has picked up where he left off with a fine start to the new campaign.

A .929 save percentage and 2.14 goals-against-average are certainly Vezina-worthy numbers.

The problem is wins are an important stat when it comes to handing out the Vezina, so if the skaters in front of him do not figure things out soon, his efforts will be for naught. Quick sits in the Top 10 of every major stat category except for wins.

At 25, Quick has matured into an elite goaltender in the NHL and it is about time he got some credit for his hard work.

The Vezina Trophy is handed out at the end of every season to the best goaltender in the league. The winner will be presented the award sometime in June at the awards ceremony held in Las Vegas.

Tim Thomas won it last year and looks to be a candidate for it again this year, as he has helped the Boston Bruins post a solid record throughout the first third of the season.

Quick will also have to beat out goaltenders Pekka Rinne, Marc-Andre Fleury and Henrik Lundqvist, all of whom are having fine seasons with their respective clubs.

Quick will have to continue to put up his current numbers over the rest of the season to contend for the award, but with his work ethic and confidence in the crease, there is no reason he could not do so.

He is tied for the league lead in shutouts with four and is on pace to record 11 on the season.

His ability to move across his crease is among the best in the game.

There are not that many teams in this league that rely on their goaltender as much as the Kings do.

He has bailed out his team on many nights and with the Kings’ skaters inability to score, has been the reason they are not buried even worse in the standings.

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Kings assistant captain Matt Greene told Daryl Evans on Kings Vision, "You gotta use the emotion to amp up and have yourself a great game."

The Bruins controlled the action in the first two periods and Rask stopped 20 third-period shots from the Kings, including stoning Dustin Brown on a point-blank effort.

Rask stood up to the barrage and recorded his first shutout of the year. He stopped 41 shots for the game.

The Bruins thoroughly outplayed the Kings early on and showed why they are a good bet to go deep in the playoffs and defend their title.  In addition to Rask's performance, Rich Peverley and Brad Marchand were stalwarts for the Bruins.

The Kings had an outstanding chance in the first period to grab the lead when Dustin Penner and Simon Gagne skated in on Rask on a two-on-zero break.  Penner shanked a shot off Gagne's feed right in front of the net and completely missed a wide-open right side of the goal.

The Kings can't afford to miss golden opportunities like this with the scoring drought they are currently in.

They now have scored two or fewer goals in nine straight games and 22 of 30 for the season.

Fox Sports color commentator Jim Fox said on NHL Live, "One clear remedy is getting goals on the power play."

The Kings failed to capitalize on a quick 5-on-3 power play in the second period and Jarret Stoll and Andrei Loktionov hit the post on the following five-on-four chance.  The Kings continued their season-long power-play ineptitude and were 0-3 with a man advantage.

Fox Sports color commentator Jim Fox stated that he didn't expect a change in the system this early.  He said on Fox Sports prior to the telecast of the game, "It''s about playing hockey.  If there's a loose puck, it doesn't matter what position you're supposed to play. Get the loose puck. Keep it alive and put it in the net."

The Bruins did this to great success in the first period.

They exemplified the teamwork and puck possession the Kings should have on the Bruins' first goal when Peverley scored an easy goal, his fifth of the year, on a perfect feed from new Bruins call-up Zach Hamill. The two teamed with Benoit Pouliot on a nice cycle resulting in the goal.

The Bruins dominated the face-off circle 34-19 and Patrice Bergeron's clean faceoff win in the second period led to Brad Marchand's first goal. Marchand rifled a wrist shot through traffic to make it 2-0.

Marchand later tallied his second goal of the game and 11th on the year to cement the win.

Two win streaks were snapped with the Bruins victory.  Both the Kings and their goalie Jonathan Quick had five-game win streaks against the Bruins entering the contest. Quick was perfect (5-0-0) against Boston going into the game.

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