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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: BLACKHAWKS v LIGHTNINGJune 11, 2015Corey CrawfordBrandon SaadTAMPA, FLORIDA: Practice Day Q. Corey, if you do win this next game, that means Game 6 will be in the building this time with a chance for you to win it here. Do you use that as motivation? COREY CRAWFORD: It's definitely motivation. But right now I think our thought process is on Game5. But really, yeah, giving ourselves a chance. But this last game was really big for us, going back 2‑2. To even this series, it's a big difference. Get some big momentum in this series. Q. This is the closest Final in 50 years, something like that. Is the pressure already so high that it can't get higher? Do you feel every shot, every save is going to be massive throughout the game? COREY CRAWFORD: I mean, we've gone through these situations before, this team. I think maybe the experience helps a little bit with pressure. I think we were able to deal with it a little bit better than maybe if it's your first year, first time going through something like this. Q. Brandon, with the penalty kill, it seems like it works in spurts. Is there anything right now you can pinpoint why it's been a factor in this series? BRANDON SAAD: I think Kitch does a great job on penalty kill. The more you play a team throughout a series, the more you get to learn their habits, obviously watching video before the series. But being a part of it, seeing how they react, their tendencies, things like that, we've done a good job all playoffs. I think we feel pretty strong about our special teams. Q. Brandon, the legendary hockey coach Bob Johnson used to lecture us about once a year about luck. He said luck is an element of the game of hockey, but you can't quantify it, analyze it or predict it the nobody wants to talk about it. How much does luck factor in in a series where the margins seem to be so fine? BRANDON SAAD: Yeah, you could call it luck. I know guys talk about getting bounces. Usually you work for your bounces, though. Throughout a series, it can go either way. You could see in Game3 there when we missed a couple open nets, bounces didn't go in for us. That kind of happened to them, too, last night. It's a game of bounces. You just try to work hard and try to get those bounces and keep the momentum. But luck's definitely a part of it. It's a tough trophy to win and a tough series to be a part of. Q. Brandon, a lot of guys still talk about you being a young guy. You've been in for three years. At what point did you stop feeling like a young guy and start feeling like a veteran or have you? BRANDON SAAD: I think every year I feel more comfortable and confident. Obviously starting off the first year with a bang, able to win the Cup, surrounded by a bunch of talented guys and veterans that know what they're doing, it helps. Having success always helps. Last year the same way. We went pretty deep. Personally had some success myself, so that helps with confidence. Every year just trying to grow as a player, to do the best I can. Still learning every day. There's still guys that have been around that have more success, better players that work hard. You can always keep learning. Q. Corey, how important do you think it is for a championship team to talk the way Brad did last night, that maybe you didn't play your best game? Some teams will say, We'll take any win any way we can get it. Do you think a championship team has to look in the mirror and say, We didn't play our best even though we won that game? COREY CRAWFORD: I mean, sometimes you have to give credit to the other team, too. They're a good team. They're fast. They're skilled. Sometimes they're going to get momentum and make plays. But for us, you know, we have to keep our confidence which we have done, know that we got to stick to our game. Not everything's going to go your way all the time. You have to be able to adjust and just keep playing hard. Q. Brandon, last night Brad Richards was talking about the Lightning and the way they defend and forecheck. Basically said that people have underestimated how good they are. Give us a sense of how frustrating it is for you guys offensively to try to get things going. BRANDON SAAD: Yeah, that's something we talked about going into the game, is how good they are really at playing a good, tight checking game, being patient. That's something we have to do as a team, not getting frustrated, taking it one shift at a time, one period at a time. Chances are going to come. We need to execute when they do. At the same time we can't push for offense because that's when we make mistakes. They're a good team on the rush and when we turn over the puck. We don't want to feed into their rush game. We want to stay patient, believe in our process and our system. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, guys. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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