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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SABRES v HURRICANESMay 19, 2006Peter LavioletteJim RutherfordRALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA: Practice Day Q. When you look at the Sabres what do you think some of their strengths are and some of things that you guys have to do to slow them down? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think their strengths are their speed up front. Their defense activate quite a bit, try to outnumber on the rush, their goaltending, their specialty teams has been good through the year. They are a pretty well-rounded team. They just keep coming at you and you really have to be prepared to play a full 60 minutes. Q. They scored a few shorthanded goals in the playoffs including the series against Ottawa. Your power play has been pretty good obviously. It's not the key matchup for you. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: It's something that we have looked at and we've worked on and we have shown video on. I think we have come to realize it probably won't be as pretty. When teams don't let you set up and they don't let you do what you want to do and you're constantly have to move and make passes, it becomes more difficult to get the plays that you are looking for, but you can also find seams through that as well and holes in it because they are so aggressive. Obviously it's a concern. We looked at it, like I think all aspects of the game. The time off between games has been good for preparation. There shouldn't be anything that catches us off guard with their power play, their penalty kill, their systems, their personnel, and they have scored five goals. I think anytime that you pressure out, which they do, they pressure away from their net and towards our net, even though it's two-thirds of the ice away, it leads to odd-man rushes. That's similar to the way we pressure. We haven't scored a shorthanded goal yet in the playoffs, but we had 16 or 17 of them through the regular season. I think that when you pressure out, there's a chance that you can score odd-man advantage goals. Q. Peter, you have three players in Rod Brind'Amour, Glen Wesley and Doug Weight who have a lifetime of NHL experience and really haven't tasted the ultimate success, are you feeling your young players are feeding off them? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I read that stat that Rod was, I think, one of the most active players without an NHL Cup or most playoff games I can't remember what it was, but obviously, that's the ultimate prize. As your career ticks on it's something that becomes I think more in the forefront than say an Eric Staal, but it's not something that we have talked about as a team. Our goal has been to win the Stanley Cup as a team, for the good of the team. One purpose, one cause, I think it would be great for those guys towards the end of their career, and I am not saying it like that, but as they become in their mid 30s to finally reach the ultimate prize if that's the way it goes. Q. How similar are these teams, tough years two years ago, small market teams, rookie goalies, really benefited from the new rules, is it almost like looking in a mirror in a lot of ways? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think they are very similar just in the style of play, the forwards, the defense, the goaltending, the seasons, the markets, I think there's a lot of comparables. Q. You both can address this: Are you worried at all that Buffalo fans are coming down in droves? They have gotten tickets. Are you worried about sort of a partial crowd being Sabres' fans down here at all? Has that been addressed? JIM RUTHERFORD: You haven't heard how many people are going to Buffalo from here. I think that's pretty standard. We put our tickets on sale and let our fans buy them first, we hold back for a period of time, but I think that we saw it in '02 where we had a lot of fans from other cities. I mean, Buffalo is used to it. When Toronto plays in Buffalo it's pretty much split who is cheering for who, or when Toronto plays in Detroit or vice versa. I don't think it's an issue. Our fans are pretty friendly and pretty hospitable so they will have a pretty good time here. Q. In '02 when you went to the Finals and '99 when they went, economics really hurt those two teams afterwards. A lot of guys had to go and success brought more money demands. With the new regime, will you, no matter what happens in the playoffs, be keeping your core group together? JIM RUTHERFORD: We'll have a much better chance of keeping our core group together, but if you recall we kept our core group together in '02. I think there's a little bit more to it if we can keep the group together and who we want to keep. Going forward, we'll deal with what is at hand here, game by game until we get to the off-season. The real point here from '02 to now is our top players are pretty young players. And in '02, some of our top players were older players. So I see quite a bit of a difference. I don't see the similarities. I will say that teams that go to the final four, the final two, they always have that short rest period and the next year becomes a challenge for different reasons. But it should not be an economic problem for our team. Q. The experience factor, Carolina has a lot more in the post-season than Buffalo, but it seems that experience even in the regular season maybe doesn't matter as much as it used to. All these young guys throughout the playoffs have done pretty well. Has the way the game has changed maybe marginalized experience to a certain extent? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I have been asked this question before, so I have actually thought about it. I would actually rather have a team that's playing very well, regardless of their age, and maybe doesn't have quite the experience. And I think we had a split decision in the office on this one, but I'd rather have a team that's playing extremely well with less experience as opposed to a team that's just playing good with more experience. I think what's a good scenario about Carolina I think there's both. We're playing pretty good, as well as we have I think great veteran leadership in the locker room. I like from an experience standpoint that there are some experienced forwards but our defense is a core of experienced players. The seven defenseman that we use regularly are all experienced defensemen. They are all older, big, strong, experienced defensemen. I think that that's really helped out defensively throughout the playoffs here. That's not to say that Rod Brind'Amour is not experienced or Ray Whitney, but to answer the question, I'd rather have a team that's playing extremely well. Q. Would you agree with that? JIM RUTHERFORD: I do agree with that. I also think when you are look at the four teams that are still in, all four teams are very happy to be here and sometimes you will get in a series where you are playing a team that you had 20 more points than and if you don't win, you really look bad. So you have the standard pressures of winning and getting to the ultimate goal, but I don't think you have the normal pressures on these four teams because no one suggested that they are the automatic Stanley Cup winners or they are the automatic winner of this series. Usually when pressure gets tighter is in the first round where you are supposed to win the round, or you know, you get that 3-0 lead, like we did in New Jersey. Then they win a game, if they win another game then the pressure mounts because you know that's not supposed to happen. A team shouldn't come back on you. So I don't see the same kind of pressures on the remaining four teams that some other teams may have had in previous years. Q. A lot has been made about Carolina surprising a lot of people by doing this well. When you put this team together obviously the goal was the Stanley Cup but were you very confident at the start of training camp that you guys could make it this far and be successful as you were? JIM RUTHERFORD: We were very confident coming out of camp that we had a good team and a competitive team that could be a playoff team. And as we're seeing this year and we have talked about it before, like in '02, we talked about whoever gets in has a chance to win. But I think more and more now with the parity in the league going forward, that if you get in you have a chance. So one, we felt like we had a chance to get in. I am not going to sit here and suggest that we felt we were going to get 112 points, but after we went through the regular season, had 112 points, won our division, I don't think anything should be a surprise anymore. Q. How much of a key to that has been the rules being enforced the way you guys laid them out when you restructured this thing? Some people said, well, get to the playoffs and (inaudible). Talk about that. JIM RUTHERFORD: A lot of people talk about how we built our team for the new system. But the fact of the matter is we had a lot of good players but we had some pretty big pieces missing from our team. It's not like we rebuilt our team in one year because we all remember, you know, unfortunately there was a work stoppage. Really this is over two years that we have been able to look at players and more players became available, and we were fortunate because of the new economic system that we could add more players this time around than we have been able to in other years. And we're fortunate that we added the right pieces. The players that came here wanted to be here. They have enjoyed playing. The players have a lot of fun playing in Peter's system. He's made it fun for them. But I am not quite sure that the team we have can only play in the new system. If in fact we had to go back to the old system, which we all hope that doesn't happen because it's not as much fun to watch, or as much fun for the players to play, I am not so sure that we don't have enough players, enough blend of players that this team couldn't play in that system also and be successful. Q. Can you talk about Ryan Miller him not being on the U.S. team but you obviously had to have watched him very closely in those decision process on whether he was going to be on the team. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think he's one of the top young goaltenders in the league. He's had a very successful year. You watch tape on him, technically he's very sound. There's not a lot of wasted movement with him. He recovers very well for second opportunities. He moves side to side very well. He has got a disposition that I believe is a lot like our goaltender, Cam Ward, where doesn't seem like a whole lot fazes him one way or the other, and it's a good disposition to have for a goaltender but he's had an excellent year. Q. (Inaudible): COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I read that. I don't even remember being Lindy's teammate. He said that he was in New York for 13 games and I was only there for 12, so he must have been better than me. But those were my only 12 games in the NHL, so I don't -- was that true, was Lindy on the Rangers the same time I was? Q. He got traded to the Rangers at the end of the year. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I had already had my cup of coffee and was on my return trip to Denver, that was it for me. 12 games that was it. I don't really remember much of Lindy Ruff. Q. With the drafting of Cam you deviated a little bit what the scouting consensus was; he wasn't rated that high. What did you see that made you -- JIM RUTHERFORD: If we did the scouting consensus, we wouldn't have to have a scouting staff. It's fortunate that we do. Sometimes we get it right, sometimes we get it wrong. But Cam Ward totally nothing to do with me to answer part of your question. It was totally our scouting staff. They kind of got to know him, got to know him personally. They knew his demeanor and also following very close in the Western Hockey League, where we scout that area very close. I can tell you though our scouting staff was adamant about Cam Ward, and even to the point that they weren't quite sure -- I think we took him 25th or 26th or something, late in the first round, they weren't sure if we would get him at that point. Then as you said the consensus was that maybe he would go in the second round, he wouldn't go that high. But our scouting staff, this is not something new to us, our staff from Day 1, when they started scouting him in the Western Hockey League said, "We need to get this guy. This can be our goalie for a long, long time." On this one they were right. Q. Peter, can you talk about the new rules how maybe the game is more fun to watch. Is it more fun for you as a coach with the new rules? Is it different for you? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I love the way the game is played. I think it was a great year in the NHL for teams and for the game itself. I think about the games that took place on the road as well, but here at the RBC Center some of the games that were here were absolutely incredible. And talk about trying to sell the game and sell the product on the ice, and give the fans a product that they want to come back and see over and over again, I think that for us here anyway it was mission accomplished because the games have been exciting, almost too exciting for everybody to take at times. But just to comment on the other part of the question, I agree with Jim; whether it was the old or the new rules, we were going to play the same way anyway. Like we were going to be a puck-pursued team and we tried to establish that back in 2003 at the end of the year. I think we took some systems but then through training camp as well, but I think that the way the game is played right now, it has turned out to be a great product on the ice and more importantly a more entertaining game. Q. You mentioned that Cam Ward looked like a guy who would be a goalie a long time. Is he ahead of schedule in any way? JIM RUTHERFORD: Yeah, I think so. For all of us in this room that followed hockey for a long time, we know that that position takes longer for the player to develop. But the fact that the American Hockey League last year was maybe as good as it's ever been in a single season with the players they had, was very good for his development. He had an exceptional year there where I thi nk he had the best save percentage in the year of all the goalies. That was in his first year of pro. And it's been good this year, the way that Peter and the staff have kind of brought him along and Marty Gerber played the majority of the games, and there's been good times and tough times for Cam because there's probably a handful of games where we play a high-risk game and he got hung out to dry in some of those games. So his experience this year has been good for him, but I think his mental makeup is what really got him to where he is today and really is an asset to him as we sit here today. Q. What are the chances of Erik Cole playing in the series? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: It's hard to comment on anything with Erik right now. He's taken steps back to where he's out of his neck brace. He's started rehab, he's been on the ice by himself for the last couple of days, but there's no -- this is not an injury that anybody wants to rush. I have said all along, first and foremost, we're happy that he's going to be able to return to the game of life, and spend it with his wife and kids. That is first and foremost. Secondly, if he plays in the future whether it's next year, training camp, if he comes back and plays hockey for the Carolina Hurricanes, that would be terrific. The playoffs really are on the back burner. If he's able to do it then we would certainly welcome him back because at the time of his injury, I thought he was one of the most dominating players in the league. It was a tough loss for us but we handled it and moved on, and I'm glad to see him doing well and back on the ice skating.
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