Kings Forward Anže Kopitar Reflects on 20 Years Playing for L.A. and Calling the South Bay Home

“That was something special,” the play-by-play announcer rightly declared.

In many respects, that introductory goal reflected the disposition of the now 38-year-old Anže (pronounced Ahn-jay), almost two decades later. As he first made his move in front of Jean-Sébastien, the 6-foot-3 forward could’ve attempted to flip the puck over the goalie’s left shoulder or perhaps squeeze it just inside the left post. Instead, he took his time—to the point of almost missing his scoring chance altogether.

“I’m a little bit more of a laid-back type of guy,” he says today, but it’s clear the affable Anže was always that way. The patience he displayed on his first NHL goal is proof.

Across the subsequent 20 NHL seasons, Anže has laced up his skates just for the Kings. This means that when he retires at the end of this season, L.A.’s captain will join an exclusive fraternity of fewer than 130 players who, over the course of the NHL’s more than century-long history, have played for only one team.

Along the way, Anže has set franchise records for the number of games played, assists, game-winning goals, point shares, and adjusted goals-created. At the time this story was written, he was also only 9 points away from setting the Kings’ all-time record for points scored.

Not to be forgotten, the team’s captain was instrumental in bringing Los Angeles two Stanley Cups. He scored two goals and had three assists during the Stanley Cup finals in 2012, and he had two more assists during the Stanley Cup finals in 2014.

“It makes it special,” he says of the opportunity to play for a single team. “We were the first team to bring the cup to L.A. And to follow it up with another one—those are the core memories that you just can’t ignore. I always looked at L.A. as my team and as my home.”

For that matter, Anže has never lived anywhere in the L.A. area but the South Bay. During the first couple of years of his career, the hockey star lived in Hermosa Beach, but he soon moved one town to the north. And it’s been there, in Manhattan Beach, where Anže has spent the last 18 years, raising two kids with his wife, Ines.

“It’s like a little bubble,” he says of the South Bay, acknowledging that the region isn’t as glamorous as Hollywood or Beverly Hills, but he prefers it that way. “It’s more of a beach style and laid-back. Everything’s a little more at ease. I think we, as hockey players, fit right in to that style.”

Just as nice, Anže says, are the community’s residents, who are loyal fans of the team but don’t let their passions morph into overbearing obsession. When he meets Kings fans in the South Bay, they might quickly congratulate him on a previous win or wish him luck for an upcoming game, but he acknowledges that they aren’t stopping to dissect the team’s power play or other, more detailed aspects of the game.

“It’s a nice mix of feeling the support, but you can have your privacy and just be yourself,” he says. “Honestly, there wasn’t a time when I thought of moving anywhere else.”

When Anže announced his retirement on September 18, 2025 (ironically, the same day that Clayton Kershaw announced his retirement from the Dodgers and Major League Baseball), the Kings’ all-time leader in games played downplayed the stats that he’s accrued and his individual accomplishments. Anže was the first Kings player to win both the Frank J. Selke Trophy (presented to the league’s best defensive forward each season) and the Lady Byng Memorial Trophy, which honors one player each year who combines high skill with exceptional sportsmanship.

“The majority of the guys who have played with me will tell you that there’s one goal that I’m trying to achieve—and we’re trying to achieve as a team—and that’s winning,” he said during the press conference. “The highs of winning surpass every high of your individual stats and numbers.”

He also reassured everyone in attendance that he’s carrying plenty of motivation into his 20th year on NHL ice.

“It’s your last season. You want to leave everything out there, so that’s really all the motivation you need,” he explains. “You want to squeeze every single ounce of your energy, your hockey knowledge, the hockey passion that you still have into that last season. I still want to win, just like I did 15 years ago. I still want to play hard, just like I did 15 years ago.”

Almost 20 years ago, when Anže made the Kings’ NHL roster, he sat in a locker room surrounded by players he had long looked up to—players like Hall of Famer Rob Blake, who helped propel Canada to an Olympic gold medal in 2002.

“I remember watching the Olympics in Salt Lake City, and the next thing I know, I’m sitting in the same locker room with those guys,” he says. “It was very surreal.”

“Surreal” is also how Anže describes his first game in the NHL, especially the moment when he scored the first of his two goals against the Anaheim Ducks.

“The NHL is the best league in the world, so everybody’s faster, everybody’s stronger, everybody’s a little bit more skilled,” he shares. “There was certainly an adjustment. But I was fortunate to score a couple of goals in my first game, so that eased my mind a little bit. I made something happen, and it was almost like a sense of belonging.”

You might think that after 20 seasons of professional hockey, it was Anže’s achy joints and sore muscles that finally convinced him to hang up the skates. In reality, it was his children.

With his two kids getting older, he realized he wanted to be more present in their lives. But that doesn’t mean he’ll be spending any less time in an ice rink. Anže’s 11-year-old daughter is a figure skater, and his 9-year-old son is following in his dad’s footsteps.

“That’s the best part,” he says. “I’ve missed so much stuff, and I’m looking forward to spending more time with them. There are still memories to be made, and as a family, we’re ready to do that.”

Although Slovenia’s first NHL player acknowledges that he may have played a couple more seasons if he didn’t have kids, he realizes that his children have provided plenty of added ambition over the years. “I take their energy,” he says, “and try to fuel myself with that.”

His kids, he says, have also been a source of much-needed perspective from time to time. “The losses are not that devastating when you come home and see a couple of kids who give you a hug and kiss and snuggle up with you,” he adds.

Despite Anže’s love of the South Bay community, its weather and the many friends and acquaintances he’s made over the years, the Kings star has plans to move back to Slovenia with his family following the season. But just as he took his time on that breakaway goal during his first NHL game more than 19 years ago, Kopitar is planning to keep his options open after he retires.

“We’ll go back for a little bit,” he says, “and then we’ll see where life takes us.”