Los Angeles To The Hockey World: Here’s 250,000 Reasons Why This Is A Hockey Town – In Photos

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LOS ANGELES — On June 14, Los Angeles, more specifically, Los Angeles area hockey fans, proved the critics wrong.

Indeed, those who claim that Los Angeles is not a hockey town were blown off the ice 250,000 times over, maybe more than that, by the fans who packed the parade route and the rally inside Staples Center, celebrating the Los Angeles Kings winning the 2012 Stanley Cup, the first Stanley Cup Championship in franchise history.

In a story published this morning, Kings fans, young and old, recent fans to those who have been there from Day One back in 1967, shared their feelings and experiences about what it meant to see their team win it all…finally.

Their remarks and sentiments were thoughtful, heartfelt, and deeply personal, and they run the gamut of emotions. I hope you will take the time to see what this championship means to a representative sampling of fans, from different walks of life:

Los Angeles To The Hockey World: Here’s 250,000 Reasons Why This Is A Hockey Town

In this accompanying photo essay, photographer David Sheehan, a Kings fan dating back to the mid-1970’s, captured some of the approximately 250,000 faces behind those thoughts and emotions along the parade route, during the parade, and inside Staples Center during the rally, and afterwards.

Congratulations Los Angeles hockey fans! Like the Kings, you shined, both on Monday night, when the Kings hoisted the Stanley Cup over their heads for the first time, and again during the victory parade and rally on Thursday. You all did Los Angeles proud. You screamed at the tops of your lungs to the hockey world that Los Angeles is, without question, a hockey town. Moreover, in true hockey fashion, you powerfully told the non-believers everywhere what they could do with their skepticism.

Way to go LA!

Los Angeles To The Hockey World: Here’s 250,000 Reasons Why This Is A Hockey Town – In Photos

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