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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: SABRES v HURRICANESMay 21, 2006Peter LavioletteRALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA: Practice Day Q. Is there a common thread with all the early goals, is it just a string of coincidence or anyone or two things that you can point to, that early goals against? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: Talking about Buffalo'S early goals that they score? Q. No, your goals against in the post-season through the New Jersey series then yesterday? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: Last night I wasn't real happy with the goal defensively, the way we gave up what we considered three quality chances happened early on in the game, one shot, one goal was in our net. For the first period it was a pretty tight defensive period for us, but that one particular instance cost us. We vacated front of net a little late on the backcheck and ended up in our net. We weren't real happy about it, et cetera. What we wanted not to do was give up a goal in our building three minutes into Game 1, so we continue to work on things. Q. What does it mean just to have Erik Cole practicing, what does it mean for the team? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: It's a positive to see him in the locker room, out of the neck brace, on the ice skating, but he still has a pretty long road in front of him. Q. Do you think there's any chance that he will back in playing? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: We're not going to comment on any injuries or lineup changes. Those are things that we'll deal with daily, but it's good, to answer your question, it's a good, positive sign that he's back and skating. That means that he's going down one road and it's two ways. He's gone down a road now where he's back on the ice. That's a positive sign. Q. What does Buffalo do on the kill that gives you guys some problems? Obviously you have been so good on the power play and they shut your power play down yesterday. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: They shut it down; it was 0 for 4. We generated chances, we didn't find the back of the net. Ryan Miller made some big saves, we had some miscues. Might be a little bit early to talk about shutting down on the power play after just one game, you know what I mean. It's not like they have got us 0 for 27, and we certainly could have used one. One-goal game and one power play goal may have made the difference, but I think in their system they are very aggressive. So now we have videotape, we can go back and look at it, and try and find some opening or some seams. But it's I think, like I said before, it's never going to be as pretty as it was in the Montreal series or the New Jersey series just because of the aggressive nature in which they kill. You are going to need a lot of quick passes and movement in order to try and find an open man. I think we had it last night. For instance, there was an opportunity where they were kind of stretched out, we threw it down to Mark Recchi, he threw one on his backhand through the defender, had Doug Weight on the back door and Doug couldn't come up with it. To me that's an empty net, back door goal. Just couldn't find the handle on it. Q. Talk about today's practice. A lot of coaches this time of year, might go for a shorter period of time. What's the thinking about how long you went today? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I didn't think that it was that long, I thought it was only 23 minutes. Q. You were out on the ice for 60. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I wasn't. Q. Okay. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: No, we ran a structured -- the guys stay out there, fool around, they can do whatever they want, but as far as the structured practice, we get on at 11:15 and we were off at, I don't know, 11:37 or 11:38. There wasn't a whole lot of structure in what I did. Just a couple of drills, stretched the legs out at the end, get ready for tomorrow. They are out there fooling around, playing their shot game with the goalie or working on some shooting drills; real low key. It was a real, for me anyway, that was a real quick practice, 23, 24 minutes. Q. Williams wasn't out there today. Is he good to go for the game? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: Like everybody this time of the year, we have got things that we're dealing with inside the locker room, but we have nothing to report on him. He's healthy and he will be in the lineup tomorrow night. Q. Talk about the adjustments you have made throughout the year, obviously been successful; Cole goes out, still where you are at, you had Doug Weight, made a seamless transition there. Your goalie switched at the beginning of the playoffs and it worked out. Seems as though you have pushed all the right buttons with this team so far. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think we have got depth in the locker room and I think in order to handle the amount of injuries that we have had this year, it's more than just Erik Cole. It's hard to replace a guy like him. I said yesterday the time of the injury, I thought he was one of the most dominating forwards in the league and to lose a guy like that, it's tough to replace but we did -- we did have good balance, I think, before that, and then you add Doug Weight and Mark Recchi, it just gives you more balance in your attack, more depth. But it's been difficult at times because there's been close to 270 man games due to injuries. It was I guess challenging and difficult but guys step up at different times, different players, we dealt with it. There's not much you can do, injuries happen, some more teams have more in different years than other teams. It was pretty significant for our team this year. As far as the changes goes in lineups or goaltenders, we have never said we have had a No. 1 goaltender, never said we have had a No. 1 line or No. 1 power play it's just not how we are built. I guess again, it's just by depth, the depth of attack, the depth of the organization is how we have had success. Q. When you get at this stage of the playoffs as much as you may enjoy having your home fans behind you, does it matter where you play? Is home ice an advantage? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: You know, if it comes down to a Game 7, I'd rather play it here than at Buffalo. So I don't know if that matters in the course of the game, but you'd rather play at home in front of your fans and than on the road. But ultimately I think once the puck drops in games there's a lot of anxious moments that go on before the puck drops, for everybody, and then the fans can really get you going into a game, at the start of the game. Once you get through a certain period of time, I think it's hockey and the two teams will determine the winner. Q. How did the severity of Erik Cole's injury affect the team? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I am not sure I understand the question. I don't think the severity affected the team, like we didn't stop going to the net or we didn't stop playing around the boards because he had a severe neck injury. It affected the team because we lost a real good player and I think shortly after that we became a little bit more inconsistent with our play, I am not sure if that was due to complacency on some nights or the fact that one of our top players is now missing from the lineup. So, obviously it was a serious injury because he remains out of lineup now, but I don't think it really affected the way we played the game. Q. How has this team been so resilient, not just game to game in the playoffs but even period to period? After last night's rough second period you came out strong in the third. COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: It's been a trademark of this team. If you follow the team a little bit of adversity has been something that has been not -- it hasn't killed us, it seems to make us a little bit stronger. Our third periods are always our best period. We have a lot of games where we come from two goals down. There's been a lot of times I think where we have been resilient, and I think losing Game 1 puts our back up against the wall a little bit more, it is a chance to challenge that again, I think. Q. Totally recognizing you haven't been around for much of it, Wesley has been the rock of this franchise, what does he mean to this team? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: He's definitely been a rock. Even last year the last time we played the team didn't make the playoffs, and we were a low scoring team and when you are a low scoring team, you don't make the playoffs you're usually giving up goals. He was still a plus 19; just a real steady defensive defenseman, and he brings a lot of experience on how to play defense. It's not about offense for him. I think our defense, one of the strengths of our defense is to get the puck and be able to skate and move it up to the forwards, all of them he can do. That we don't have -- although Frantisek Kaberle had an excellent year, there were lots of (inaudible) career years on defense, but it's not your typical No. 1 offensive power play defensemen that has 70 points or 60 points, we don't have. But they are all capable. He, for me, best exemplifies the defensive defenseman on our team that helped make sure that our end is well protected. Q. Is he entering that Andreychuk territory now? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: As far as? Q. Inspirational win for him, anything like that? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: We haven't talked about that or gone down that road. I am sure that there's a lot of guys, Rod Brind'Amour, Glen Wesley, guys that have been around for a while, played a lot of hockey that haven't won a Cup, it would certainly be nice to get that done for them. Q. Not having a No. 1 goalie or No. 1 line, the guys say this team is extremely close. Do you think that's the reason why, and is that something that you believe across the board you have always tried to do, not having No. 1 for that reason? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I just don't believe in numbers, really. I just think that in a team concept, in a team game you get a lot of different play, play exceptionally well. (Inaudible) We need players no matter where they play or what their linemates or what role they are asked to play in, we need them to play outstanding hockey for the good of the team. We do have a close team in there, close knit bunch. I think that's one of our strengths. Q. You mentioned Recchi and Weight, they were brought in for the playoffs. That worked out pretty well. Does it become more important as you get deeper in the playoffs? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think that when we made those trades one of the things we said, we added depth to our attack. I believe that we did do that. They both have contributed offensively at key times through the playoffs. It's not like we didn't have an Eric Staal or Rod Brind'Amour and Doug Weight had to come in and fill that No. 1 center position. We just needed balance from our lines and their additions with their experience and skill level, their competitiveness, their leadership commanded that I think added balance to our attack. Q. Did you learn anything about when you coached Chris Drury at the Olympics that you didn't know from coaching against him? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think when at the Olympics and then he was the captain of the team and we won the World Championship -- the bronze medal in 2004, and I know his brother, so I know the family a little bit, and they are just, I think, they are great hockey players. They are also tremendous people, both him and his brother are good people. One thing that he is, he's very competitive. He plays all situations, he plays them hard. He's the type of guy that says the right thing, does the right thing, tries to play the game the right way, tries to practice the game hard everyday. Q. How important is momentum coming after a win or a loss into the next game? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I mean, we're going to lose games. If we go on to win a Stanley Cup I don't think it will be a sweep, sweep situation from hereafter losing Game 1. Like I said, I think that our team has responded well when faced with a little bit of adversity. Although we're -- it's not do-or-die tomorrow, it's another step where your back is closer to the wall. We certainly don't want to be 0-2 against Buffalo going into Buffalo, so you wish you had won Game 1 and you had the momentum, but we don't. So we wake up today, we're a little bit more desperate, and that's not such a bad thing to be a little bit more desperate. Q. Regarding the early goals, do you see any jitteriness, or any kind of nervousness in Cam Ward at all? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: No, the first goal wasn't Cam's fault. The first goal, even back to New Jersey, the first goal in New Jersey, a couple of double ricochets or something like that. No, he doesn't strike me as that type of a person, jittery person, and has not proven to be jittery. Q. He said after yesterday's game "The third goal is all on me." What does that say about Cam Ward? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: That he's honest. I am sure he would like to have it back. But you won't find anybody else saying that in the locker room because again, it is a team sport. We had lots of opportunities on the power play, lots of opportunities 5 on 5, we had 20 minutes of ice time in the second period which we really didn't play very good hockey, so, we had lots of other opportunities to do good things and I think there's a lot of things that happen through the course of a game where players would like to have the situation back and I think that's just an honest statement. He'd probably like to get another crack at that shot. Again, he's been pretty solid for us. Q. Seemed that there were a lot of occasions where the shots were taken and Miller had a clear view of them and grabbed them. Did it seem that way to you? Do you think you need more traffic in front? COACH PETER LAVIOLETTE: I think you always look for traffic, but one area we talked about today was defensively tightening things up in our end. For instance the first goal against, you know, we left the front of net we left somebody point blank, that can happen. I think one thing we did do offensively just miscued on a lot of pucks. Just didn't sit right for us, so we didn't get the wood on it that we were looking for. Thank you.
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