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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINAL: LIGHTNING v PENGUINS

May 26, 2016

Jon Cooper

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Game Seven

Pittsburgh – 2
Tampa Bay – 1

COACH COOPER: Well, before we go, I just want to congratulate Pittsburgh. I think -- and Coach Sullivan. They were a really tough opponent, and they deserved to win tonight. They did a heck of a job.

Q. Coop, one of the things they did was limit your shot total. For most of the series, especially the last three games, what is it they did that limited your offensive output?
COACH COOPER: They're fast, and so if we're playing the game a little too slow and not executing, it's hard when they're playing "D" fast and they're right on you. And I thought, you know, we got caught -- when we were in those situations where we probably should have shot, we passed, and we passed when we probably should have shot. We kind of got caught between a lot of occasions.
They play "D" well. They play hard -- and the other thing is they block a lot of shots, and that was evident this whole series, and the amount of shot blocks were just incredible, just couldn't get them through. When you're one and done all the time because the shot is blocked and bouncing out of the zone or they're getting a rebound, it's tough to generate offense.

Q. There was a lot of speculation before the game whether or not Stamkos would play. Just to have him in the lineup with you guys, what did it mean to the guys in the room? What did it mean to you as a coach for him to kind of step up for this Game 7?
COACH COOPER: Well, he's an extremely important player on our team, and we weren't quite sure when this was going to happen, but a decision was made that he could play for Game 7. It was an emotional boost for all of us. The guys were really excited to have him back, and I thought he did a great job.
I tried to get him in early. He was taking really short shifts early until he was getting his legs, and every time I looked down on him, he was feeling more comfortable and more comfortable.
Then as you see in the third period, he was really -- he was -- it was like he never left, and I thought their line did a great job in the third. We were just having a hard time generating shots.
But he was a big boost for us, and he makes us a better hockey team.

Q. Coop, I'm sure it will take a few days to grasp the scope of this, but if you could wax poetic about the adversity this team has been through this season and how proud you are of this group for getting to this point considering what they've been through.
COACH COOPER: Well, everybody that plays in this league and coaches in this league knows how hard it is to just get to the final or get this far in the playoffs. We sit here and talk to Steve Thomas on our staff, and it took him 19 years just to get to a final, and our group has had a chance two of the last three years to get there. We didn't reach a goal to win a Stanley Cup, but I'm pretty sure not a lot of people were picking us to get this far, especially with the catastrophic injuries we had to extremely important players on our team at the beginning of the playoffs.
And we just started plugging other guys in, and players were just rising to the occasion. You know, it's tough to go injury free. Usually the teams that keep going have -- you know, they stay injury free for the most part, and we didn't. We got hurt before the playoffs, during the playoffs, and then maybe it caught up to us.
But as I said, even with a full lineup, that's a heck of a team over there. We pushed them to Game 7. We just couldn't get over the hump.

Q. Coop, was it a sense the last three games -- did you get a sense you guys wore down a bit, or was it more just the way they were playing?
COACH COOPER: I don't know. If you really break down tonight's game, the first period was just what we wanted, and we held them really to nothing, and we didn't get anything, which was tough.
And then the third period, we were in their zone for most of the game. But it was that, in the end, penalties hurt us, and it wasn't on the scoreboard where their power play was eating us up. It was just the amount of time we'd have to spend, and it sucked momentum out of us. That's what happened in the second.
You know, when Jon gets that tying goal, we're pretty fired up, and it's a little bit of an killer to give up that goal in the next shift. I bet you -- I don't know if we had 20 minutes of power play in this series, and I guarantee they had well over 40. When you're killing that much, it's just momentum killers for you, and that hurt us in the second period for sure.

Q. What did Vasilevskiy do for you, not even just tonight, but just basically from when he had to come into the game there?
COACH COOPER: Well, let's be honest. I don't think we're where we are in this series if it wasn't for him. It's amazing for such a young kid, you know, to play the games -- to play in the Stanley Cup final already, what he did last year, and then to have to come in -- you know, he helps us get to Game 7. He was the rock back there, especially talk about the chances and shots they had. He was incredible for us. Obviously, he's got a bright, bright future.

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