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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: HURRICANES v PENGUINSMay 22, 2009Dan BylsmaRALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA: Practice Day Q. Talk about the physical play near the end of the game, especially, maybe she Satan's fight? COACH BYLSMA: Playoff hockey tends to get that way at times. And that game certainly had a more physical feel throughout the contest. Not just at the end. I think they probably wanted to try to get things going and send a statement. You know, I thought it was a good job by our team standing up to it, and Miroslav did something uncharacteristic. But, you know, I know that he certainly gained a bit of respect from our locker room from the way he handled himself there at the end. You know, good teams and our team toughness is sticking together, and I think we did a good job of that. Q. In your eyes, how much or how little does a 2-0 lead against this team mean? COACH BYLSMA: Well, we tried to win Game 1, and we tried to win Game 2. So we're happy with the 2-0 lead. But, you know, the strength of their team has been their resiliency. The strength of their team has been their ability to play, and match you and work and be relentless regardless of the score, regardless of the situation or the series. That's what's made them so successful. That's what makes them a great team. The challenge is staying focused on our team, and trying to get better in areas where we need to get better at. And continue to play the game we need to play to have success. Because we can count on them going home and using their home building, and coming out with even a stronger effort than they showed us in games one and two. Get some strength from their team. So there will be no quit in them. We need to understand that and be ready for it. And we need to be focused on our best game in Game 3. Q. Coach, with the talent Sidney has and that line in particular, do you even concern yourself with what another team's trying to do against it? Do you even pay attention to the match that they're trying to get, especially when you go on the road? Or do you just forget about it? COACH BYLSMA: I don't forget about it. There are certainly match-ups that we talk about and we think are ideal for our team. But in any given game, the flow of the game, I'm not a Coach who will take off certain lines just to get another match-up that we think is the best. We do what's best for our team. We have players that we trust in a lot of different situations and any given night it may be the one that called upon as the one who wins the face-off, particularly to the right of our goalie we're all lefty with the exception of Craig Adams there. So last night Sid was the best guy in the face-off circle there. So he was the guy that went out late in the game to get that face-off. So we have match-ups that we want, and we're certainly concerned about them, and you try to keep putting your guys in situations that we think are going to give them the best chance to have success. Whether it's defensively or offensively. But we have a lot of trust in our guys. We have a lot of guys who can play in different situations. So you don't want to take your team out of the flow of the game as well in terms of chasing a match-up. So we're concerned about them. We know what's out there, we know what we want. But at the same time we have a lot of faith in our players. Q. A lot has been made of Carolina's resolve. What about your team's resolve? Has that surprised you throughout this playoffs? I mean, Game 6 against the Flyers, down 2-0 to Washington. Last night it seemed like Carolina was starting to gain some momentum, and your team just kept pushing along? COACH BYLSMA: I think in the playoffs you need that if there's going to be success. There's going to be high emotional swings. Road buildings, momentum, difficult calls, shifts in momentum with the goals like last night where we seemed to get up and they then they tie it. We do it again, and they get the lead coming out of the first. It certainly is a time when your team has to entertain thoughts of can we stop this team from coming back? I think our team has had the mentality, and we've tried to maintain the same mentality that no matter what happens, we're going to try to play the same way. We believe in the way we play. We know how to play that way, we execute that way. And you keep duplicating it over and over again, regardless 69 situation, regardless of the score, regardless of the series and where it's at. When you can do that, you give your team a chance to continue to have success. Our team has been very good at that. But it's always a challenge. There's always another challenge, and we have to be prepared for the Game 3 situation. They're going to play their best game of the series on Game 3. That's what we need to anticipate. We need to anticipate the hostile crowd and the environment that that's going to create for us. And he we need to be ready to play our game, and play it for 60 minutes, and try to take the other things out of the scenario and just play our game. Q. I know it's been your intention to put the puck on net a lot. Can you talk about outshooting your opponent 11 consecutive games and what that does to a team a, wearing it down physically or mentally? COACH BYLSMA: Well, we don't start off by saying we want to outshoot the other team. We have an idea where we want to play and how we want to play the game. And that's going to end up, if we play it well, we'll end up in the offensive zone more, and shots to the net, pucks to the net, bodies to the net is the recipe for any goalie. So when you look at the end of the game and you see 42 shots on net, that's a pretty good indication that we've played the right way, and a lot of times throughout the game that we got to the offensive zone. S that we got shots there that they were working hard to recover pucks and maintain puck possession in the offensive zone, and getting pucks there. They have a great goaltender. He's strong in a lot of areas. He can deny you a lot of great opportunities, so you need to make sure you get as many as you possibly can. You get guys going to the net, and our goals were an example of that situation where it wasn't just one crack at it. We had to get two, three, four opportunities at them to get the puck behind them, and that's what we need to keep focusing on. Q. You mentioned you are going in to one of the more hostile environments in the league. How much does it help your players I mean in the first round you go into Philly, everybody knows how rabid they are. You go into a Game 7 in Washington. And, you know, where those people are at a fever pitch, and you manage to win there. How much do you think going through that helps your players in this situation? COACH BYLSMA: I think it's a test. When you get into it, it becomes very emotional. You can't communicate. The momentum's in their favor. You make a mistake or even a team breaks the puck out of the zone in Washington, and the crowd starts cheering like a regular season goal would be. Just the momentum shifts are there. It's tough to keep your cool. It's tough to keep your composure and having the experience of Philly, which is, you know, crazy. When they unleash the fury in Washington, it's built for TV. It's crazy, the emotions in those games. You know, we're going to get it again in another tough building. Playing with their fans. You get it when you drive in and they're all out on the lawn getting ready for the game. It's a great place to play for them, and it's one we're going to have to deal with. It's about trying to play the right way so that you can just continue to get pucks into the offensive zone. And that's a great way to take crowds out of it. You know, we're going to have to be faced with that. Luckily we had the Philly and the Washington for two unbelievable places to have to play, and we'll get another one in this Game 3. Q. Can you give us your assessment of Jordan's play against his brother through two games? COACH BYLSMA: Well, I asked Jordan before this series if he wanted to play against his brother, and he was all up for it. He knew what his responsibility in the first two series was usually the other team's top line. And he wanted that again in this series. You know, it's a tall task. It's a guy who drives their team with work and speed and physical around the net. It's a tall task. Considering you have to do it against your brother, it's a different element to it. But in terms of playing it the right way, their line has done it the right way for the most part in terms of getting to the offensive zone. They manage the puck well. And in a lot of the success we had last night it was stemmed from their line and getting it going in the offensive zone. Geno's first goal, they get it going in the offensive zone, and Jordan changes. Geno gets to come out and get the goal. It has a lot to do with their line. It's not just playing defense, it's the way they managed the puck, got to the offensive zone, and Tyler Kennedy, Matt cook, and Jordan have been doing a great job of that. That's where their success lies is the way they handle the puck in the offensive zone. End of FastScripts |
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