Our defensive zone coverage can get better. Turning the puck over has killed us. We need to eliminate those type of mistakes. |
Reggie has done a lot of things away from the play as far as his defensive play and his play without the puck. He's been in areas and made some big plays without the puck as well. |
Second place is on the line here, boys! |
That team played us as tough as anyone has in a long time, and it's like a playoff atmosphere in that arena. It's just amazing, but we were able to get out of here with the wins. |
That's the main reason for where we are in the standings. |
The level of play is a little bit quicker, the guys are a little bit bigger and a little bit stronger. Playing against that caliber of talent forces you to elevate your game. |
They're big, they're strong, they skate well, they're well coached. There's a lot of positives to their team. I think it's going to be a battle. If you look at the games we've played, they've all been tight. There's not much separation. |
To think we're going to go up there and it's going to be a walk in the park is wrong. They haven't beaten us all year. They're hungry. They're in our same division. We're banged up right now and we know it's going to be tough up there. |
We just kept things out of the middle. We kept our feet moving instead of looking to make a play. When we got it inside the offensive zone, we really simplified things. Let's get the puck to the net. They're a good defensive team. In order to beat them, you're going to have to get people and pucks to the net. |
We're getting too cute, too fancy (with passes). That's what happens when you got new guys coming into the lineup that are skilled players playing with guys who are skilled players. Everybody wants to show off and show how great they are and how fancy they can make things happen. As a result, we turned the puck over and we all looked like we had no idea what we were doing. |
Yeah, there were (defensive) breakdowns but there were also variables into having those breakdowns. I think a lot of the mistakes that we made are definitely preventable, but they're a lapse of mental awareness and that happens with fatigue. I'm not trying to make excuses. This is just the reality of the situation. |
You can't win hockey games that way. Chances are you're using the same personnel to kill penalties that you have on the power play so it cuts your bench short. It takes away any kind of momentum that you have. |
You have to go back to that (blowout) loss to Charlotte in early December for the last game where we played like that. |