NHL WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: AVALANCHE v RED WINGS

May 30, 2002

Jiri Fischer

JIRI FISCHER: Waiting for Game 7 after a win is much better than having two days after a loss, so we are confident just like they are, in, you know, our capabilities are just like they are. I think we're both very similar teams, except the first two series they went through Game 7s, and we haven't. But we are a very experienced team, and I'm sure a lot of the veterans will set a great tone for Game 7.

JIRI FISCHER: Well, pretty much when I get up I watch the clock, make sure the routine is clicking the way it should be, and I don't waste a minute on doing something that I shouldn't be doing. Obviously every hockey player is at least a little bit superstitious. And in my case, you know, it might be more, it might be less. I don't know. But I just really try to make sure I just keep doing the same things as before the win. So I try to remember everything I did and go from there.

JIRI FISCHER: I make sure I don't get into bed too late, but that's probably the only time, and make sure I get the food at proper times, and it's all in the head. It's these two days that we have in between, you know, I'm sure there is a lot of little things going through everybody's heads. And we'll see who is tougher mentally, who can handle it better. And that shows on the ice hopefully.

JIRI FISCHER: Well, I'm relaxed. I'm calm. And maybe butterflies will come. I never went through a Game 7 before, but it's exciting. I'm extremely excited and I'm glad it's going to be at home again, and we have to do a better job. We owe it to our fans, and so they deserve all the best effort we can give them. And we'll see how we're going to come out after a game.

JIRI FISCHER: Well, in my hockey career would be I think in juniors, probably losing Game 7 on the road in the finals to either advance to Memorial Cup and then winning the President's Cup in Quebec Major Junior or going home unhappy without the ring. So that was as close as I've ever come, and this is not comparable at all. This is something maybe 100,000 times bigger than everything else. It's everybody's dream, no matter how many Stanley Cups you have, no matter how many awards you've won. Everybody wants to be in the finals. Everybody wants to participate, and everybody wants to win. And that's great. This is a huge challenge for everybody here in the locker room. And we have a really good feeling about it.

JIRI FISCHER: We lost. We lost, so I went home unhappy.

JIRI FISCHER: That was '99. Yeah, '98 I got drafted. '99 we lost to Bathurst, and it would have been that year I played in the Hull Olympics, and the Memorial Cup was in Ottawa, which was 30 minutes away. And there was a huge competition between the French side and English speaking side, and that's why everybody was hoping we were going to win. And people at home were already buying tickets for the Memorial Cup, and I think we were going from fourth seed in our conference. And fortunately our goalie was unbelievable, and our team got really glued together. And it's been very similar these playoffs, even though obviously the difference is we finished number one. But we had some ups and downs and we didn't start out the playoffs the way we would like to, and maybe against Colorado we gave them more than we would like to at certain times. And now we just can look back at it and say, oh, maybe if we'd done that, if we had done this, you know, it would have been a whole different story. But, no, Game 7, everybody's excited, and I can't wait for tomorrow.