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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: FLAMES v LIGHTNING

May 31, 2004

Darryl Sutter

CALGARY, ALBERTA: Game Four

Q. The series has gone from team to another so far. Any special thing you would like your team to do tonight to break the trend and keep your winning streak alive?
COACH SUTTER: It is different, quite honest to win two in a row. So that's our biggest challenge overall. We want to try and take I advantage of having the last change and getting the right players on the ice. I think we have to do a better job of that tonight. We are not going to change our style. It's that simple.
Q. Your club, you have been learning your lessons along the way. You lost a critical Game 6 against Vancouver. You had that chance against Detroit and you won it. You blew a couple of home games against San Jose maybe last round. Do you see a team that's learning from the mistakes it makes?
COACH SUTTER: Well, to be quite honest, we felt that some of those losses have been victories us. I think the Game 6 loss against Vancouver in here was the reason we won Game 7. We lost in triple overtime. I think we proved something to Vancouver in Game 6 allowed us to win Game 7.
In the last series against San Jose, we felt the best game we played in the series was Game 3, and we lost it here. That's our team. We can move on from that. Like we talked about yesterday, the series is now 2-1 now. We didn't expect them to be up 3-0. We didn't expect to be up 3-0.
Q. It looks like Brent will be named Canada's coach for the junior club. I wonder, if you don't want to specifically talk about that, maybe if you could just address how he's developed as a coach and how you feel what his strengths are --
COACH SUTTER: He's a great owner, great manager, great coach. (LAUGHTER) It's about time somebody recognized it if that's the case.
Q. Do you think Tampa Bay, if they want to play tough with you guys, can they compete with you?
COACH SUTTER: Everybody is talking about that way, way too much. What do you mean by "playing tough"?
Q. Vinny drops the gloves with Iginla and kind of makes a statement there --
COACH SUTTER: Who do they have? I'll ask some questions. Do you think that has anything to do with the series? We're a fast team. When we don't skate we're not very good team. That's the bottom line that gets overlooked with our team. Anybody can play physical, but if you are not fast you are not going to be at this stage. If anything we have learned as we have went along in the Playoffs that our speed is a factor. It was absolutely the reason that we beat Detroit. It was a huge factor in Game 7 against Vancouver and against San Jose, they believe they were faster than us and we proved them wrong. It had nothing to do with the physical aspect of the game.
Q. Tampa is fast but --
COACH SUTTER: They are the fastest team we have played. So if we're not skating -- it doesn't look very good when you are running out of position to hit somebody. That's for sure.
Q. Would you talk about how Andrew Ference has handled the increased ice time?
COACH SUTTER: I think that there's times where he's looked tired.
Q. With the line combos you kind of switched up in the last game, was that much of a product of the score or you seeing people that you thought either were going or weren't going?
COACH SUTTER: It has to do with who we wanted to play against certain -- say, that's the advantage we have in our building and how much they play Vinny's line and Brad's line, how much they play whoever is playing with those two guys. Who we were getting out there, some of our guys weren't meeting that standard against them that we needed. We just moved it around to allow three guys to get away from both those lines to try and help us.
Q. Prior to this series did you have any relationship with John Tortorella? Ever work clinics with him?
COACH SUTTER: No.
Q. Ever get to know him as a coach before this?
COACH SUTTER: No.
Q. Any admiration for what he's been able to do, get his team this far?
COACH SUTTER: Damn right. Both those guys, Jay and John. That's you know, really when it comes down to it, when you get to this point, you are two different leagues; they are in a conference, we're in a conference. And during the season those 15 teams on that side over there, you have allies over there that you can use, so there's a business relationship all the time. If you look at similarities between our teams, when I have talked to Jay during the year, you know, it is because we were both in similar situations in terms of farm teams where we can put players, what we can allocate in terms of moneys, you know, to the development and things like that. There's a business relationship between the general managers, no question, and with the coach. We have only played them once. I probably talked to and meetings things like that, but you don't -- the eastern side, if there's guys you don't know prior to this to coaching against them or from some other playing against them or whatever, then it is tough to get to know guys over.
Q. Back on Ference, could you just evaluate his play in these playoffs since he's had the increased ice time?
COACH SUTTER: He's played really well. We're still playing and he's still playing a lot of minutes, so obviously he's playing really well.
Q. The other night Ville Nieminen after the game said that he thought that the club could still play better. When you look at it, 3-nothing shutout, you got a power-play goal, they didn't score on the power play. Do you feel like your club still has --
COACH SUTTER: Nieminen is the team spokesman, so.
(LAUGHTER). If he felt that way, then hey, geez (laughs). He's right on top of all of that, so if he's -- hey, that's how he feels then we're going to kind of ride that one.
(Laughs).
Q. This team has come so far in just one year. Where were you a year ago at this time? What were you doing and could you have envisioned this?
COACH SUTTER: I think we were getting ready for the draft. I think we were trying to put together you know, we went through so many meetings, two, three weeks of meetings with players and management that you are trying to not only get ready for the draft, but then July 1st, because we had so many -- I think we had 16 or 17, in the organization, restricted free agents. That's what we were doing. It was a lot of long days.
Q. Simon took a lot of criticism last series, but this series he seems to be making a major impact. Can you talk about --
COACH SUTTER: He's a major impact last series, too. He scored some big goals for us, a huge impact in the last series. I mean, the criticism that he got was probably from outside; not inside.
Q. Is it tough going into a game, treating it the same way of this magnitude, the possibility of going up 3-1?
COACH SUTTER: Not really. It's our eighth series -- 7-game series and we have -- I know it sounds neutral or middle of the road, but that's how we have -- I really believe that's why we're still playing and that's why we'll process -- it's the fourth game of a 7-game series.
Q. I know preparation is a huge part of what you do. How do you manage all of this and the demands of media?
COACH SUTTER: I don't handle you guys very well. (Laughs) I just try and, you know -- you know, quite honest, hey, you guys know how I am with the media. If it's one and one, I love to be able to help you with anything. But to be quite honest, I rather not have to do, you know that. I'd rather have all the other coaches up here talking to you.
Q. I guess the specific question is because of all the rights' holders here, you can have as many 4 or layers during intermission?
COACH SUTTER: Try 5. Try and make sure there's 5 of us and 5 of them so there's 10 in the room. I am serious. Hey, it's part of the Stanley Cup Finals, but you know, we have had two instances where we haven't got players back to the bench in time to start periods. Wow.
Q. How about making adjustments during the course of the intermission when you have got all those guys? I mean out of the room, how do you handle that?
COACH SUTTER: You are not doing a whole lot of, you know -- you are going to go over one or two points between periods because guys are just trying to reload what they are doing, the guys that are, you know, some guys are getting some medical attention, some guys are you know, they are getting ready to go. I know anybody that has been in there understand that that's all they are doing. They are just trying to refocus on what the game plan is and stick to it.
Q. I know you have been building this team with an eye on two, three years down the road with your free agents. How difficult is it going to be to keep this team together with your payroll?
COACH SUTTER: Pretty easy. You are still -- this doesn't speed anything up or slow anything down. It doesn't -- we talk about the new system or the new world in terms of Collective Bargaining, well, we have that world. We deal in that now. We just want everybody else to. We have a number and it's like a pie, that's what it is. Either you can fit into that or you can't. I mean, it's not -- it's a reality. It's what it is. I don't deal in anything other than that. I don't deal in trying to be optimistic about it or pessimistic about it. I just deal -- that's what it is. Here is what is available, and if we can work with it, we'll try and keep the player, that's it. I mean, I think we saw that last summer. So it's not going to change this summer with our team.

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