NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: MAPLE LEAFS v HURRICANES

May 15, 2002

Paul Maurice

Jim Rutherford

COACH MAURICE: Sure, definitely it could be a lesson in media relations. Have to do a couple of classes at university to really prepare for all of this. But it's really been great, I think because we had a little bit of a reciprocal deal, even our local paper, with the Montreal Gazette and some things where both sides get a little better glimpse, not just for this area for fans, but also for Toronto and Montreal. I guess now in some ways, a bit of a lesson in what fans are like here, because they have been so outstanding, and the building has been great. It really gets rid of a lot of, I'll just call it rumors, because that's what they were, about how hockey has been received down here. It has been embraced and now people have gotten a firsthand view of that.

COACH MAURICE: I agree. I think because of the way the team is built, Toronto is built a lot more like New Jersey. It has some forwards that can punish you and guys in the back end with some good size that make it difficult to get to the front of the net. You're not going to see the extent of offensive zone time like you saw against Montreal because you can't control the puck for as long a period of time. At the same time, we're still going to have to employ some of our quickness to be able to get in on the puck.

COACH MAURICE: Well, from a hockey point of view, what a great situation for everyone. This is one of these deals that worked out well for Gary and our team. We got to have a player like Gary with us and help so many of our young players, and really kind of add to what was starting a bit of a fitness craze in our locker room, with Brind'Amour and Francis and these guys who are so physically fit. He fit in well and moved on to a place that was perfect for him at his time in his career and opened doors for players like Battaglia. The ice that he had now Bates Battaglia has; we now reap the benefits of having Battaglia over the course of the year. It worked very well for both organizations.

JIM RUTHERFORD: In Gary Roberts' case, it wasn't a financial decision that the organization made. With most free agents, you know, we decide what we feel is appropriate to pay free agents, and we draw the line there. In some cases, or most cases, we end up losing that player, but in Gary Roberts' case, it was not financial. It clearly was the fact that he wanted to move back closer to home and he could settle his daughter into school and not keep moving her around, and he made that personal decision. But, you know, we could not move the cities and move the schools around to accommodate that. All we could do is offer him a good place to play. And as Paul said, he was very good for us. In the years he was here, when we were trying to build this team towards a winning team, we tried to add character guys. Gary Roberts was one of them. Rod Brind'Amour was one of them, Ron Francis is one of them and all of those guys contributed in a way that these players you're seeing playing today for the Hurricanes have picked up on and have benefitted.

COACH MAURICE: Gary, really when you take a look at Jeff O'Neill's progress fell right in line. Kevin was the first player that was brought along in that character work ethic mode. He was the first trade we had made with a real eye on that and this was very early on and then he spent some time with Gary. Kevin was one of those guys that just gave it every shift every night, and then Gary was a guy who also trained for a purpose and he worked out for that purpose, and that really helped Jeff. And that's, really, I believe that's how your team gets better when your young players, talking about Cole and Battaglia and Vasicek get to go through that, have those kind of leaders to help mold their careers, it really is a tremendous benefit to them.

JIM RUTHERFORD: Well, I don't know how quick he sensed it would come along. But he clearly said when he left that he really felt we were on the right track and that he saw good things happening. But no one knows how quick it is going to happen. You don't know how players, how soon they are going to develop. When is Erik Cole jump in and make the impact that he's made this season and in the playoffs, and when do some of these other players come along. You know, when do we make changes to make our team more balanced and more responsible defensively, like in the Adams trade where we picked them up. Adding strength and goals. You don't know about all those pieces when they are going to happen. But he always had a lot of respect for this organization, and he did when he left.

COACH MAURICE: Well, you know, those two steps come after a real long journey, and I think that we had made progress each and every year in our last four years, and I'll go back to the Jersey series last season which really had an impact into the way our team thought and our young players and also helped our coaching staff, and maybe Jim could talk on, to identify those players you still had questions about: Would Battaglia get to the next level; would these guys perform under pressure situations. And that helped answer some of those questions coming into the season. We did get a few surprises, when Cole comes in and plays as well as he does. But at the same time, we felt all season and I had said this before, I probably said it more than I wanted to during the course of the year, that we were a better team, but at the end of the day, until you win, you are not going to get credit for that. So now we have won two rounds in the playoffs and people say, hey, your team got good real fast, but the fact of the matter is, this has been a progress. If we were to look at it short-term, I would say from the Olympic break on, we our team was very, very good. And in the early part of isn't when we struggled in my mind it was because our schedule was so difficult in the first part and really took a toll on us. But this has taken maybe a little bit longer than -- it might seen like it just emerged, but we were a pretty good hockey team this year.

COACH MAURICE: That's where, and it's not that I disagree with you, it's because the facts are we were struggling. I didn't think we were struggling quite as bad. I really felt we were fatigued. But when we were playing the month prior to that, we were not real sharp. But we were playing very good positional hockey. We were tying some games, we were winning some games and we were hanging in there. We were still in first place. But the thing that I liked is we were almost playing the exact same game we are now; we just didn't have a lot of jump because we were fatigued to the point we could not move as well. And now in the motions of the playoffs and the fact that we are fairly healthy, we are able to play well in position and be sharp and that's been a big difference.

COACH MAURICE: The things that the three bring in common is they all have a certain physical mind set to the game. I don't think any of them describe themselves as playmakers, so the foundation parts of their game are really almost defensive in nature. They finish their checks. None of them run, but they finish their checks. They play hard along the boards. They are conscious about moving the puck deep. And then in the ways maybe that they would differ, Brind'Amour has such great experience and he's a great faceoff man. Bates has excellent speed and very creative puck skills. Erik Cole is a bit more straight ahead, hard driving forechecker and he has very fine puck skills. The three of them are to the point now where they have played so much together that it is more than just three quality players on the line; there's some really fine chemistry.

COACH MAURICE: I think when you're not going the first reaction that you would have is break that line because they are similar. Like Ron could use one of those guys for a physical presence. But, I think the first game, they played a little bit together -- we played a game in Dallas that we tied in late December, I believe -- no, it was just before Thanksgiving. It was probably the 20th or 21st of November, tied, our goalie stood on his head but I thought that line was good, and against a team like Dallas, if you can produce offense against that team with their defensemen that you really should be able to do it on any given night. But as coaches do, it was too good. So I broke it up. (Laughs). And they came back together in and out, but after the Olympic break we decided that would be the line we would hold together and let them spend some time together.

COACH MAURICE: I see both. I see both things happening. One, I really saw an up swing in his game over the last two, especially, and really for me a lot of times you can see so much in practice, and he practiced very hard in practice again today. There's an advantage that it spreads some offense out with O'Neill and Vasicek's line, and there's also been advantage putting him back with Francis, and then you have two, what I would call, stopper lines, or lines that at the end of the game or in tight situations, you could come back and forth with and still give you a real strong edge, and that's going to be important. So, I think where it's at is: As we perform well, it stays. And if there's some situations that we're not comfortable with, that may change.

COACH MAURICE: And depth is so very important, it will only take them so far; character kicks in right after that. You can opinion putting good players. But the mental toll it takes, losing players like Sundin, to be able to do what they did, and to beat two real tough teams, really good hockey teams to get here, it says a lot about the leadership in the room. And it also says quite a bit about Pat what and the job he does keeping that room together, where in a place that what gets done gets sent through the washing machine five times. He's done a very, very nice job getting that team to compete against a good team.

COACH MAURICE: Sure. The thing that scared you most about Montreal was how they got there and the thing that scares you most about Toronto is how they got there. When you invest enough into a situation, you very likely will fight a lot harder to keep it, and they paid such a huge price to get here and now they are going to get some guys back healthy, we have a great team going.

COACH MAURICE: I'm not concerned with Mike's comments, no. (Laughs).

COACH MAURICE: It will be a physical series and a physical game, very similar to New Jersey.

COACH MAURICE: First, they don't get time to adjust because Paul made the change during the game. And then, you know, as soon as Arturs was right back in and on to his game, I think it makes it difficult for the opposing team because they have just placed one goalie that's coming off real good game and then all of a sudden they have to go to another goalie and they have seen, you know, through their careers, and know what he's capable of doing. So I believe those changes with the goalies have played a big part in where we are today, and I do think it's hard on the opposing teams.

COACH MAURICE: Jim. (Laughter) he's been working out.

JIM RUTHERFORD: Well, the scouting staff drafts the players. And Sheldon Ferguson, who heads our scouting has done a very good should be job. Sheldon Ferguson and Tony MacDonald are the two guys that scouted him the most. And what you see in him today is exactly what they described leading up to his draft day and the day we drafted him. They described this player to a T, and he has become the player that they drafted. And the qualities are what you see, a two-way player, very strong, very determined player.

JIM RUTHERFORD: We knew it would get us closer to this point. You never know. There's a lot of good teams and there's a very fine line of winning and losing in this league. You know, the fine line goes back to the two saves in overtime that Kevin Weekes makes against New Jersey. That puck goes in and now we are down 3-2. I'm not saying we would not have won the series, we might still have won the series. But we knew our team was stronger when we made those changes. We were so much stronger defensively. We had so much more confidence as a team. And the mobility of head began has been very good, his defensive play has been good. Kevyn Adams on faceoffs and he's a good defensive players, kills penalties. And then of course adding Kevin Weekes gives us so much more depth on goal and a different situation than what we have ever had before because now we have a younger goalie who can play. I do think this is a much better fit with a better goalie than having two guys at 35 and 37 years old. So we felt very confident that our team was stronger, but I could not sit there and tell that you day that we would be here today.

COACH MAURICE: I don't have a great answer for you. I've never been able to grow a beard. So those are one of those traditions, I guess. And Jim maybe -- not that he's that much older than I am -- I'm just saying that he might have a better perspective on how it was originated. (Laughter) I don't think he knew Abraham, I'm not saying that. Got to be careful with these quotes. (Laughter).

JIM RUTHERFORD: I don't have an answer for you. I really don't know how it started.

COACH MAURICE: But there are some rules to how this all works. It's not as hard and fast rule in our room because Ronny decided he doesn't look good with a beard on or whatever it is. Some guys shave and some guys don't. Some guys work real hard at it. Those are the fun ones the guys that are giving it all they have got but just nothing there. (Laughs).

COACH MAURICE: Absolutely. Sami, as I said, has played eight great games, four bad ones, and the eight games that we won, everybody in that room played great and the four that we don't, nobody does. So at this point, those statistics are -- and I understand, used for the guy who comes through with the big goals, but this is a team game. And I know this is a cliche, so I won't throw too many at you, but at the end of the day, we really don't care if Sami scores ever again as long as our team keeps winning.

COACH MAURICE: No.

COACH MAURICE: Some of Sami's best numbers were against Montreal, of his career. So those things are all for not now.

COACH MAURICE: Well, you have to be aware of the elite players, and if it's not -- if it's not tomorrow night, then we will have the normal adjustments that you would make during the course of a series and then have to assess how well you've played if we are not successful tomorrow night, we are going to have to make adjustments even prior to Sundin coming back. But we could have to be aware of what defense plays against him. Almost in line with the Sami Kapanen question, it's not just one person; it's who they play with and how the rest of their team gets restructured when a player like that comes back.

JIM RUTHERFORD: Well, we're excited about it. As everybody knows, it's been a long road. Sometimes dealt with some very difficult situations. So, you work towards winning. You know, people want to compare and suggest different things about why the game is drawing more interest. The bottom line, and it's the same everywhere you hear different reasons why about the Hornets left. But the bottom line is people like to be around a winner, and this is really good for this market, especially in a year like this where we had 9/11 and the economy has not been good. When you can have a focal point where everybody can rally around, it's so good for everybody. And I just think that everybody involved, not just the people that have been in this from day one, it's so good for them. It's good for the media. It's good for the fans. I think we have the most respectful fans in all of sports. When you look at what our fans did, compared to other fans in other cities where they sang both National Anthems, I think that tells us how special the market that we have is. So, it feels good now. I don't want to suggest that it feels great because we are only halfway to our goal, but it's nice to be a part of something that's turned around.

JIM RUTHERFORD: Well, as each year has gone by, you know, we as an organization felt that we were making headway in all areas. But really, you really don't get to see it as much as you do until you win a couple of playoff rounds, and that's the way it works everywhere. So we have gained respect, credibility, that we deserve, by winning these two playoff rounds, and that will turn in to success in every area, you know, in everything we sell, in the business part of this, and more importantly, to our team, that our players have gained confidence and they are being respected the way they deserve.

COACH MAURICE: You really hope one part carries over: The confidence of the shooter. But we got every break, from a time where we had not gotten any up until that point and then everything went right. I think one of the things we have talked about is being careful, of not having the breaks go and having that frustrate you. We didn't get frustrated early on in either series if we felt the breaks were not there. We kept hammering at it and playing our game. If you come back after having some real good luck around the net to not having any, how does your team handle that, do you get frustrated or do you go back to just keep going with your game plan. We've addressed that. There are good things. We've got guys that have scored goals that feel good about themselves now, about you we'll watch, early especially, and we would expect these games to be very, very tight and hard-fought, but there will not be the same number of scoring opportunities that we got against Montreal in that series and we have to be mentally prepared for that.

JIM RUTHERFORD: Well, the rules are the rules. If they want to argue that, or whoever wants to argue it, you should argue it at the managers or the Governors Meeting at the time. The guidelines of the league don't always suit everybody. I believe that if a team in this league gets into the 90 points, that they should be respected for that. That's a good regular season, and that's not that big a difference between the point level. It's not like it's a 100-point team playing a team that had 78 points. So anybody that doesn't agree with that rule, they probably should bring it up in the off-season and try to get it changed if they can get enough votes.

COACH MAURICE: I don't think there were a lot of teams lining up to play New Jersey in the first round. (Laughter) FastScripts by ASAP Sports ...