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UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN HOCKEY MEDIA CONFERENCEJanuary 26, 2015Mike EavesTHE MODERATOR: The men's hockey team hosts Minnesota this weekend, for a pair of games at the Cole center, as the two teams square off in a series for the second time in three weeks. Fridays games starts at 8 pm, while Saturday night is a 7 pm start and both games will be televised by BTM. Head Coach Mike Eaves is here and we will take questions. Q. Mike, I know you were disappointed with Saturday and you normally meet with the captains on Mondays, too. Were you able to glean anything from them this morning about just the feeling of the club itself and its performance against Michigan? MIKE EAVES: We didn't meet this Monday, we meet every other Monday. This morning wasn't one of the Mondays. I watched the film yesterday at home, and it's interesting. I thought we actually were better in our zone than Friday, and yet the thing that bit us in the backside was three goals were scored below the goal line almost from the bottom of the circle down and that's very unusual for our goaltending so I think if we can come out of that first period down 2‑0, we're still in the game and got a chance but the game was 4‑0 and it was gonna be a real miracle to get that done but we actually played better without the puck in our own zone, but the game was kinda out of reach at that point. Q. Mike, you just got done playing the top two power plays in the country, you get to face Minnesota one more time, 84% kill percentage, pretty good. What have you seen from those units? I know it starts with goaltending but what other elements? MIKE EAVES: Starts with goaltending then the guys in front of the goaltending doing some very basic things, like in the penalty killing there's your forecheck, not allowing them to come into the zone uncontested. We've done a better job making sure that they can't skate into the zone and set up. We battled them at the blue line. Second thing is when we got a chance to get the puck out we made plays and got the puck 200 feet. And then thirdly, if you watch our penalty killing in our own zone, you notice that our spacing is better, our sticks are more active. We're working in unison as a group of four in front of them so those are contributing factors to why the penalty killing has been better. Coach Shu, he's done a nice job with those young guys, bringing them along. Q. What's the biggest take‑away that you have from your previous series with Minnesota that you think will benefit your team this weekend? MIKE EAVES: Well, I think not only playing them but playing Michigan which is a similar team in terms of their team speed and skill. I think that we know what we're going to get ourselves into on a big sheet of ice. I think that's a big thing to take out of playing them last time. We're familiar with what they want to do in the power play and penalty killing, that should help us out so I think that familiarity will breed well for us. Q. Do you expect or are you concerned anything they carry over from last time you played a couple of weeks ago? MIKE EAVES: No, other than it's going to be a competitive series, always is. Doesn't matter where we are in the standings, it's always competitive, hard fought, and it will be much the same this weekend. Q. Outside of moving Joseph will he bait from the wing to the center and maybe some moments where you had guys on the bench Saturday, you haven't really changed your lines. Is that something that's more of a thought at this point in time? Do you like what you see from the chemistry? MIKE EAVES: We talked about it in terms of which guys are real candidates to be in the top‑six and I think we have that and we've seen some good things from Joseph and Besse and Rockwood at times and we have seen some good things from Hughes, and Zuli and Sole at times, the consistency hasn't been there but we ask ourselves is use staff see ready to be part of that mix, is Wagner? Is Navin? You know, at this point we don't think so. It's about staying with that, we've seen some good chemistry with those top‑six forwards and we need to find consistency, back‑to‑back games. I thought Hughesy's line Saturday was really good this they had some terrific chances and I can't believe Hughesy doesn't have a goal yet, some of the things he's been doing and his line mates. I think in terms of what we have and the people playing together, we have to stick with that right now. Q. I mentioned a key word, consistency, do you chalk up the lack of consistency to inexperience this year or is it more than that? MIKE EAVES: It is a big part of it. I would say it's a majority part of it. And as we get older as human beings, as adults we become more consistent with the way we live our life and not fall down in the mud every once in a while and it's especially true with these young people who are between 18 and 23, trying to figure it out! When a guy turns pro one of the reasons you become a pro in something is because you can be good day in and day out and that's something we strive for with our kids and there is a lot of written material about that frontal lobe right now and how it doesn't develop until you're 23, so that's part of their development with us so we will keep pound that go and try to find that button and help them grow to that. Q. You've drawn a line in the sand on Saturday. Is it an open competition for all positions for Friday? Isn't that the way it is all the time? MIKE EAVES: It is. It's about, again, you know, we're not a professional team where we can send guys down or trade for guys. Really the only piece that we have that's controlling is ice time. You kinda get caught between a rock and a hard spot because if you sit one of your top‑six guys for very long it hurts the team, it's a gentle kick in the fanny to say, "You need to wake up and get going here, you're hurting your teammates and you need to straighten it out." So I think we're at a point where we know our players better now than we did in the beginning of the year, obviously and we can do stuff to gently remind them, hey, wake up, it's time to get goin' here. Q. Things haven't been going your way in the win column but what could a win against Minnesota do for this team's mind‑set? MIKE EAVES: We got a taste of that Friday up in Minnesota, there is a euphoric high that exists and it creates a confidence level. We talked about confidence already this year in the fact that you create some of that in practice by how hard you work, you feel good about yourself and you solidify that confidence by how good you play in a game in terms of solidifying that, it's that final ingredient for that cement to make it hard in your confidence level. So having to get a win or having a win against a rival would do great things for our confidence. Q. You know about the history of this program, to celebrate 25 years since that 1990 championship team? MIKE EAVES: Yeah. Q. Quite a long time ago? MIKE EAVES: It is, it's amazing how time goes by. This group especially‑‑ I didn't know this group very well before coming back to Madison to take this job, but heard how close they were, what a hard‑working group they were and just a kind of get‑it‑done group, a lot of strong personalities in that group for sure, so for them to come back and celebrate Saturday will be a piece for them to enjoy. THE MODERATOR: Anything else? Thanks, Mike. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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