Formal Opening: Tie a Must

Bombs burst in air.

A Phantom sang the national anthem in operatic fashion.

There was the requisite light show that is part and parcel of every building in the laser age, and there were 18,118 who wanted to be part of history.

There were firsts everywhere at Staples Center, which had spent a couple of days being a den for rock ‘n’ roll, and Wednesday pomp gave way to circumstance when the building made its debut as a playground for its owners, the Kings.

There was the first overtime.

There was the first tie, a 2-2 result fashioned when the Kings’ Jozef Stumpel popped a puck over a prone Boston goalie Robbie Tallas with 1:09 to play in regulation with goalie Stephane Fiset on the bench in favor of an extra attacker.

That extra body became Glen Murray, who sent the puck out from behind the net to Ziggy Palffy, who sent it to Stumpel, who did the rest.

Tallas had to deal with a convention in front of him that included Luc Robitaille and a host of teammates.

The goal rescued the evening for the Kings, who had fallen behind, 2-1, with 2:23 to play when the Bruins’ Sergei Samsonov took a puck from behind the net, pushed past Murray and fired a shot that Rob Blake rejected, but with insufficient authority.

The puck went back onto Samsonov’s stick and then over a fallen Fiset.

It seemed the goal was a result of Boston’s experience at this opening-night business. The Bruins, after all, opened the Pepsi Center--known as “The Can” in Denver--with a loss to Colorado six days ago.

With the way the season has gone, new building or not, it would figure that the Kings’ first goal would come on a power play. That was accomplished in the second period by Blake, who got help when Robitaille flashed in front of Tallas with the intent of being either a distraction or tying the game.

Blake’s goal, his fourth of the season, came on a shot that was launched from near the blue line, a one-timer that was set up by a pass from Palffy at 10:32, and all Tallas saw was Robitaille.

The King power play had been clicking along at a 33.3% rate coming into the game, with nine goals in 27 opportunities.

The math held up, because the Kings connected on their third power play of the game.

To that point, anything resembling power had been shown by the Bruins, who had been holed up in the desert in Scottsdale, Ariz., for four days, trying to figure out why they were 0-6-2.

They gave every indication that they had solved their problems when, in the first period, Anson Carter deflected a puck past Fiset for a 1-0 Bruin lead.

It was the third of a three-shot flurry, with a long rebound going out to Jonathan Girard, who backhanded it goalward, there to be handled by Carter.

The goal energized the Bruins, whose forechecking kept the Kings on their heels through most of the first period.

That ended with Blake’s goal.

From there, the Kings had chance after chance, and Tallas spent the evening making the Bruin decision not to meet goalie Byron Dafoe’s $3-million-a-year demands seem golden.

In fairly rapid fire, Tallas faced:

* A breakaway by Murray, whose shot sailed wide.

* Another breakaway by Craig Johnson, whose shot found Tallas’ pads.

* A shot over a prone Tallas by Donald Audette, that stayed out of the net only because Tallas reached up and nabbed the puck with his glove.

* A shot off the post by Blake on a third-period power play.

* One by Ian Laperriere that went through Tallas’ legs but was impeded sufficiently by his pads to stay out of the net.

Not that Fiset had it much easier.

He handled flurry after flurry of shots but got a bit more help from his defense.

The overtime was played to win--this, after all, involved teams from different conferences with a point already to their credit and little to lose--and included a two-on-one in which Stumpel fired point-blank at Tallas, with Palffy trailing the play and being knocked into the net.

Fiset’s situation was somewhat less problematic. He dealt with 28 shots, but could have taken the overtime off save for a shot by Kyle McLaren at 2:56 that resulted in a scrum in front of the goal, but no dent in the net.

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BY THE NUMBERS

18,188: Wednesday’s attendance, a California record for hockey

4:12: Elapsed time before first goal was scored at Staples Center (by Boston’s Anson Carter)

16-11-6: Kings’ record in home openers

6-2-2: Kings’ record in home openers in the ‘90s

4-0-1: Kings’ record in last five home openers

7: Kings’ home openers that have gone into overtime

12-10-5: Home teams’ record in home openers this season (Carolina opens on Oct. 29)