|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: FLAMES v LIGHTNINGMay 26, 2004Dave AndreychukMartin St. LouisTAMPA, FLORIDA: Practice Day Q. Marty, talk about last night. A lot of chances for you, one goal. Do you feel you are sort of on the brink of really breaking out and getting back into that high-scoring mode again? MARTIN ST. LOUIS: Well, I think last night is one of those games in a while that I have had a lot of scoring chances. That's a positive, I guess. But again, scoring chance after a while means nothing if you don't bear down and capitalize on them. Obviously I had a great -- had two great opportunities in the first period that could have made a difference. I wasn't able to capitalize, but you can't dwell on that. Just got to take the positive out of it and move on and I'm getting ready for Game 2. I am hoping -- I am going to work hard to get as many chances again and hopefully capitalize. Q. Have you had as much room to skate and play your game in the last couple of weeks in these playoffs as you did late in the season, or is there still a bit of an adjustment there for you? MARTIN ST. LOUIS: No, I mean, you play the game the way it is. Sometimes there is not a lot out there and you don't want to make too much either because you don't want to be cheating, you don't -- you know, and playoff hockey sometimes it is that way and that's the way you have to play. And to me, that's great because we have to win games and different guys stepping up and different heroes every night, and that's what you need. But at the same time I fight hard to find myself some ice out there and be creative. Q. How much harder was it last night? I mean, were you surprised they came out with the trap as early as they did last night? MARTIN ST. LOUIS: Well, I don't know, were they trapping? (Laughs). I didn't really feel the trap to be honest. I mean, I thought we came out pretty decent. I thought our first period was a pretty good first period. They get a good bounce on that goal. We had a few opportunities in the first and if we capitalized, it could be a different game. But, you know, they are a sneaky team. They are fast and they surround the puck really well. They work hard. And I don't think we were surprised of how hard they work because we have known that. We have seen them play. They beat three good teams and to do so you have to be a hard-working team. Q. Dave, Dan said that you were the one who broke the news to him last night. How did you find out, what did you say to him and how did he react? DAVE ANDREYCHUK: I was told after I got off the podium last night to go in and to talk to Torts. Torts is the one that informed me. I went to find Boyle, I told him. Obviously he's a little shocked. I guess anybody would be shocked if your house has been caught on fire when you are not home. I think he settled down a lot better after we talked to him. He went back to the house and found out the damage and you know, he's fine today. But initially it was a little shock. Q. Could you please talk about the challenge of lining up against Jarome Iginla and trying contain him, I guess? DAVE ANDREYCHUK: It definitely is a challenge. He's a very strong player. He works very hard. He has that edge. He has a lot of intensity. That's what makes him a very good player. We're going to try to contain him as best we can. He made some good plays on skating. He used his legs. I think we contained him when he had the puck down low. I don't think they had a lot of chances that way, but he did some good things when he got skating. For the five guys that are on the ice against him, we're going to have to concentrate on trying to shut down that line because they work very well together. Q. Marty, you talked a bit about the first period. How important is it for you guys to start well? Calgary's only given up four first-period goals in these playoffs. They have really made a living by scoring first. DAVE ANDREYCHUK: Especially at home we would like to get the momentum, get the crowd on our side. We have done very well when we have scored first, also. I guess that's important in the rest of this series is try to get the momentum early, but I think we did, like Marty said, I think we did some good things in the first period. We had some good chances. The starts of games, through these whole playoffs is not just this series, but all the series that we have been in, have been a key part of winning games. Q. Last I looked Marty was one of the leading scorers in the playoffs, goals and assists. Can you address the demands he puts on himself and his desire to deliver for the team in those critical moments? DAVE ANDREYCHUK: I mentioned this before, is that Marty is a guy, that's why he's the top of the league because he demands a lot from himself. All the good players do. He's a guy that wants to carry the load. We're trying to help him out as best we can, everybody else around him. He expects a lot. So that's the kind of example that's kind of filtered down through our room. That's why we're at where we're at. Q. Marty, how would you rate your level of play in the last ten games? MARTIN ST. LOUIS: I don't think that -- I think my best series had been the Islanders. I think the Montreal series and the Philadelphia series, they weren't my best series, but fortunately we had different guys step up. But I think you know, as players, your game goes up and down throughout the year. It has been a long playoff and my game has gone up and down, but I feel my game is on the way back up. I know last night was a loss, but I did something last night I hadn't done in a while. I guess I am going to take that into Game 2 and hopefully capitalize on the chances I can get. Q. Marty, can you explain the role that Dave plays in the team's motivation to win the Stanley Cup, not just because he's never been here before, but also from what the impact he has had on the franchise? MARTIN ST. LOUIS: Dave came here and obviously his experience speaks for himself. His numbers speak for itself. And Dave is a goal scorer. Dave will always be a goal scorer, but he came here and filled a role, changed his game a bit, I guess, in is more of a defensive-oriented player, but still able to score 20 goals while doing that. To me that's tremendous. Just how he leaves it out there every night in every situation, defensively, offensively. He leaves it out there and for us to see that, sometimes actions speaks more than words. Here's a guy who's been in the league for a long time. He's our oldest player on the team and one of our hardest workers. Obviously he's a guy that his voice weighs a lot in the locker room but his action, I think, weighs a lot more. Q. There's always a negativity that comes after a big loss and press conferences like these are a part of it. It seems to put guys on the defensive even though they have accomplished a lot to this point. You think the things you can draw on and things you want to explain to your teammates about when something like this happens, it's just a one step back or how are you going to handle it for the guys in the room, Game 2 as a must-win? DAVE ANDREYCHUK: I believe every game is a must-win, first of all. We want to get the momentum back in the series. By winning a game we can do that. We talked about it in the room after how quickly it goes to address it now; to not wait until our backs are against the wall to have a must-win. A must-win is every game, like I said. The message that we're sending out in our room is that we have to go for it now and not wait and see what happens. That's what the -- that's the attitude we have taken all playoffs. No matter the losses that we have had, we have been able to rebound with the attitude that we got to get our game back. Q. Calgary forecheck last night created a couple of turnovers and put a lot of pressure in your back end. Watching videos is it hard to tell how fast that team is or do you have to play them to realize it? DAVE ANDREYCHUK: I believe that they are all on the same page. They are very well coached. When you know the player is going to flip it out of the zone, you can get some speed. That's why they can get on top of us. Their game is pretty simple. They are a hard-working team that's thinking all the same. There's no second thoughts of what they are going to do and that's why they can get on top of our D. We were aware of that. We knew what kind of forecheck they were going to have. But their guys get skating and they chase down a lot of pucks. Q. Last night a lot of their defensemen logged a lot of minutes. You faced a similar thing in the last series, defensemen logging lots of minutes. Is there specific things that you do to keep wearing them down as it goes along and to keep up you guys with the speed? MARTIN ST. LOUIS: You have to make it tough every night on the defensemen, on the guys that play a lot obviously and one way to do that's having to play below the top of the circle. They are battling below the goal line and to be able to do that, you have to bring the puck there and sometimes chipping the puck in, a couple of cycles, is better than just trying to create any open ice. Sometimes when you try to create any open ice, you turn the puck over and they go the other way, you didn't get that chance to wear the defensemen down. I think that's one thing that, you know, we talked about and unfortunately we weren't able to do it as much as we wanted to do it in Game 1. But I think we will respond.
End of FastScripts... |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|