The most important thing to us is our mental health. In that respect, we are ready to go. |
The only bad shot is one you don't take. |
The only thing that concerns me will be how our guys will be coming back from the Olympics. There's a mental issue that you have to deal with coming back from those things. These guys expend so much of themselves at this event. It's such a pinnacle at two-thirds of the way through the season. I don't know how that magnitude of an event is going to affect them. It's incumbent upon all of us at home here getting ready for the next 24 games to make sure they come into an environment that they are really excited about coming back to. |
There are teams in the league and teams I've coached in the past for which the puck is inconsequential - we're not really built that way. We want the puck as much as we can. We want to make sure we are the ones taking care of it, not Pittsburgh. |
There might be a minor sense of relief there for the players. |
There might be a minor sense of relief there for the players. They've certainly been on a mission all year long to acquire this playoff spot. It might even free us up to begin to turn the corner and play like we had been playing for the most part of this year. I think we're a little tight. |
There's a certain standard that we have to pursue every day. Hopefully we are setting a standard for everyone here to really pursue and identify with. |
There's no benefit-of-a-doubt stuff in the playoffs. You're in the big parade now and you have to participate. If we give ourselves a chance to play five-on-five hockey, then who knows? |
There's no question we'll be better prepared. We should be more competitive off the get-go. |
They all felt that they've been well prepared, well organized and that the game plan was appropriate and that they needed to check in mentally and emotionally to go and execute. I'm not sure where that leaves you at the end of the day as a coach. You're still sort of picking straws. |
They are going to come out harder (Saturday). I'm sure of it. They could've won tonight. The difference was our specialty teams. |
They play a complete game and they have their identity that they've recaptured because it wasn't there for them in the first half of the season. Obviously, as they found theirs, we kind of lost ours. |
They really care about where this team is going. They have an ear to the past and what's happened here, but they've also really assumed the responsibility for where this team is going to go - the effort we're trying to make to gain respect back from our fans and from the NHL. |
They take good point shots, create traffic at the net and they're hard people to move. Whoever wins the specialty-team game should win the game tonight. |
They're in the NHL. They're on our team. We have to generate more shots, we have to generate more traffic. We have to make life tough for our opponent to defend so that even though they might not be pretty goals we certainly can put the puck in the net. |