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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINAL: PENGUINS VS SENATORS

May 23, 2017

Guy Boucher

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania - Postgame

Ottawa-2, Pittsburgh-1

Q. Coach, what does it say about your team, the way they responded after a 7-0 loss in Game 5?
GUY BOUCHER: All year we said the same thing about our players. That's our team. The guys are fighters, and they choose to fight. They don't choose to bail out. They don't choose to freeze. They choose to fight. That's something they've developed individually and as a team, and that's why we're still here.

It's an unbelievable team on the other side, so it takes every player, everyone's character to be able to do that, and that's what our players displayed today. Them getting the first goal and having to come back again.

So we wanted to give our best in front of our fans. What we didn't want to do was run-and-gun like we tried the last two games. We knew we couldn't do that, but I think the game that we played here, the great game -- it was great to win it, but it hurt us. It hurt our identity because it gave us the false -- I guess the false impression that we could go out there and match them offensively. I mean, they've got the most offensive stars in the league. Nobody has that. So if we thought that we were going to match that and go head to head in their style, it burned us.

We knew that before the series started, but I think you get excited. It wasn't the plan, you just get excited, and we learned from that.

Today we didn't want to do that. We wanted to be ourselves and make sure that we didn't give them any freebies and breakaways and two-on-ones and three-on-twos and four-on-twos, like our turnovers -- three turnovers the first period the other day, we just killed ourselves right off the bat. So we didn't want to do that.

So if they were going to beat us, it wasn't us beating ourselves at least. That's what one of our biggest focuses was.

Q. 45 saves with the season on the line for Craig Anderson. Talk about his incredible night.
GUY BOUCHER: I think what he's done all year, in terms of focus and rebounding and coming up with big saves, I think, is at the forefront of what these guys have been doing. They believe in each other, and they know that there's a lot of big time guys in that room. It's not always the same guy.

But obviously our goaltender, if you look at our season -- Condo has played really good, having to play 26 games in a row, and he held the fort. You could think that the -- when your number one comes back, he's rusted and everything. Comes back and he takes us to the playoffs.

Now it's a roller coaster all series, not just this one, but all the previous ones. And he's been terrific at reloading mentally, physically, and emotionally. I think it's the measure of our team.

Q. You guys had the possibility this morning of calling White into the lineup. Just talk about that decision and his play tonight.
GUY BOUCHER: We've got some guys, centermen that are not able to take face-offs right now for some reason. First of all, we always knew this was going to be a speed series. These guys are a first-on-puck team, and they're quick in transition. So always had in mind that he could be a possibility because of his speed, but also because he's reliable.

He's one of those -- usually, young guys come around, they just want to be great and score a goal, and they don't get it. It's always the same. Young guys, the ones that are mature and understand, don't hurt us before you help us. Those are the ones that are able to adapt quick, and he's got that, and we knew that. That's why he had the maturity to come in today and give us the shifts he gave us, and he did really well.

And the thing too is we weren't on the road. If you go out there and you're on the road and you get the opponent sending their best players out there and superstars, that's not fair to expose the kid to that. At home, I can match him and put him on whenever I wanted to, and that helped.

Q. Guy, in getting to know Craig Anderson this year, what was the moment for you when you really realized what you had in him as a goalie?
GUY BOUCHER: Last summer. I'll be honest with you, if I didn't have a No. 1 goalie, I didn't want the job. I've lived it for quite a few years, and it's hell when you don't have it because everything you do turns to darkness, and there's nothing that really matters when you don't have a real No. 1 goaltender.

That was one of the biggest reasons why this job for me was appealing. It wasn't just an NHL job. You don't want an NHL job. You want a job where you have a chance.

It's my second job in the NHL. I've been in this exact spot in 2011, seven games in Conference Finals. The years after that, there's one thing I've learned: You need a No. 1 goalie, and that's what I felt. This guy is a real No. 1 goalie that can make you steady and give you a chance to win, and everything else mattered after that.

I can tell you, it was last April. Last April is when I got excited because there was an opportunity on the team where they have a real No. 1 goalie. And there's been guys like Erik Karlsson that had room to grow and all the other guys, but it starts with the goalie. It's always going to start with the goalie for me because I've been humbled enough now in situations where you can play great and you just can't win. It's like a quarterback in football and a pitcher in baseball, and we have it. We got that guy, and we've got a great backup.

This is a good situation, that's where it starts.

Q. Guy, having been there before, how would you describe what it's like for a team to play one game with a chance to go to the Stanley Cup Final?
GUY BOUCHER: I've been lucky enough in my career now I've had quite a few seven games, and Team Canada, gold medal games, where it's that one game. For me, it's excitement. It really is.

I look back, you know, it was the Boston Bruins back then. It was a tough game. It was 0-0 with seven minutes left in the game. It was quite a game and a lot of pressure. What I remember most is the excitement of an opportunity that very few people get in their lives, and I'm part of that. I can't be blessed more than that.

It's only my fourth season in the NHL, and that's twice I lived that. There's so many great coaches, better than me, that have done 15 years in the league and still haven't had the chance to be in a Conference Final. So I have to be grateful for that.

Personally, myself, I'm blessed, and I feel lucky. Yeah, I guess I fell in at a good place at the right time with the right people. I owe a lot of people a lot for that.

And for the players, I think there's a lot of guys in there that have never lived it. A lot of our guys, like a guy like Dion, 13 years in the league, and he's never been in the Conference Finals. So that's exciting for him to be here.

I think what we have to watch out for is thinking of Stanley Cup Finals. That's -- like today, it wasn't about winning series. It's about winning one game. We've won a lot of one games this year. We've won a lot of pressure one games. That's what it's about.

So that's what I remember. If you get ahead of yourself, you get an excitement that's very difficult to manage. So we want to make sure that we manage it like today. We need to be calm. We need to know what we are. We need to know who does what, and we know that. We have to be ourselves to give ourselves a chance. Last time we went there, I got shellacked, so not great memories.

But it's a new day, and the only way we're going to get to have a chance is to play with our identity and our tools. That's all we want to focus on.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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