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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: PENGUINS v RED WINGSMay 29, 2009Mike BabcockKen HollandDETROIT, MICHIGAN: Practice Day THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach Babcock. Q. I saw you out jogging earlier, running down the board walk. What goes through your head on these kinds of runs? Are you thinking about this match-up, or are you completely somewhere else while you're running? COACH BABCOCK: Yeah, I don't know. I run there as much as I can in the spring. The city's done a real good job here of making the river bank nice. And there's people walking out there. I usually run in the morning. Didn't have time this morning, so I go out there at noon. You know, when you win, it's a fun place to run. Q. Can you run through the wounded for us. Most of them are on the ice today? COACH BABCOCK: I think everybody's ready to go. Pavel's going to be the only last-minute decision. Everyone else will be ready. Q. Ericsson as well? COACH BABCOCK: Ericsson's playing for sure. He just didn't want to with the surgery he had, they didn't want to put him on the ice today. But he'll be ready to go tomorrow. Q. As you know since Gonchar got hurt, Dan Bylsma's run 7 D and taken a forward out which he's pretty much ruled Malkin and Crosby, sometimes Jordan Staal. But mostly Malkin and Crosby on that fourth line. When you look at how to defend the Penguins, does that add an extra wrinkle in how you go about it in their explosiveness? COACH BABCOCK: I think so for sure. I think right down the middle it is a huge strength for them without any question. And what you do is you turn your fourth line into a regular line or a line you've got to watch just because the best players or two of the best players in the world, for sure, and another big man are playing down the pipes. So it creates match-up problems for you, no question about it. Q. This is number three for you. You talked about the fun winning. Is it the same thrill as the first time or has it become more of a business-type feeling more often it happens? COACH BABCOCK: No, it's the same thrill. I think the most exciting part for me is how excited the players are. I've said this a number of times. That the playoffs are totally different than the finals of the until you've been to the final in the Stanley Cup you don't realize how exhilarating it is for the players. Just the scramble, especially this year, to get your family in and to get tickets and all that stuff. Then the extra hype. I thought today, for example, the puck was bouncing over our stick a little bit. Which, for me is a great team. We are a veteran team see that very often, a little excitement never hurt anybody. But it's a great thing. I've been real fortunate. Paul McClain and myself in the six years there was a lockout. But we've been in the league seven years, but six years we've been here three times and real fortunate to be here. You can go a lifetime and not get here. That means you've coached real good players and you've got a good manager getting you players. And our team is excited. And we're going to be ready to go tomorrow. Q. How do you feel about a rematch the Cup final from last year? And secondly, I know you've dealt with this a few times during the year, and Marian's dealt with it, but you know the story of how he left and here he is now playing the team he left to come to your team. How do you think that might effect him or how it might change things for him? COACH BABCOCK: Well, I think, you know, just to talk about the Marian thing, I think it's a great situation, obviously, that we get to play Pittsburgh. They're a real good team. They're playing well. We know them, they know us. Should be a good battle. I think it's real good for the National Hockey League. We're an original six team with real good players. Sidney Crosby, I mean, you can't turn on any TV that covers hockey without seeing him. Actually, when I watch the commercials from last year I think they won not us. So I have to check every once in a while to get that figured out. So I think it should be a lot of fun. As far as Hossa goes, he should be pumped right up to play them. In saying that, he chose to come to our team. As a man, made a decision, and I think he probably feels it's a good decision. We think it's a good decision. And, you know, now we get a chance to play his old team. I don't think there's anymore to it than that. Q. The season is long but the playoffs are long, too. How has your team grown, changed, matured in this playoff run specifically? COACH BABCOCK: Well, I think that's what happened this year at playoff time is we've had another opportunity to prove that mental toughness is what toughness is all about. You come and you bring your game each and every day. You have a chance to be successful. Part of being a Red Wing is that you bring it every day. And that you bring it year after year after year. That's what we've been able to do since the lockout. We've won a ton of hockey games since the lockout. 218 to be exact in the regular season. You know, that can go a long, long time for you to win that many games. Then just playoffs, we've had a lot of success in the last three years. Ideally, it will keep going. Q. As a coaching staff, do you guys use a guy like Conklin as a good scouting source? And if so, what type of information can he provide you guys having been a pen from last year? COACH BABCOCK: I asked him, Gene Bernard asked him questions. He told me we did a good job today. Some of it is just affirmation (smiling). But it's like anything. We know them pretty good. They know us pretty good. I don't think there will be a lot of surprises. They play more like we do now. I know Dan pretty good. And they play a lot of ways very similar to last year, but a lot of ways different, too. You know, we have a pretty good understanding of how they play. But, you know, in the end we can do all the prescouting we want and be as prepared as we want. In the end it's going to come down to just a little line in the sand and who wants it more. Q. With so much success that Dan Cleary's had in these playoffs, is he a different player than he was or is it just happenstance the way the puck bounces? Has he changed at all? COACH BABCOCK: Well, last year he played the majority of the time with Drapes and Dallas Drake, so your chance to generate offense and for people to talk about them were slim. Yet they ran the crap out of people. I like that, too. So he's got a different kind of role this year just because of the tile kind of team we have. He scored 20 goals a couple of years ago, and then we didn't use him. We haven't used him on the power play hardly at all in the playoffs. He's very good on the net on the power play as well. He's a very versatile guy. In Chicago I played him on a different line basically every game. In whatever line he was on he was successful. Just depended on the road. We wanted a match-up against cane, and just made it easier for us. His confidence has obviously really grown, and he's earned the right to be talked about. Q. Concerning Chris Osgood, I can't remember, maybe it's happened a goalie having to take a break, a leave of absence whatever it was and come back and shine on this stage. Looking back to that time, is this -- obviously, this is the result you would hope for. But did one cause the other? And how concerned were you about Ozzie back when he had to take a leave? COACH BABCOCK: Well, we were concerned because Ozzie wasn't being Ozzie. Ozzie is one of the best teammates. We used to call him Zimmer a while back because of Joe Torre's bench boss there with the Yankees years ago, because he was that good. He was always there for the coaches to talk to. He was a guy who knew everything that was going on on the team. We used him as a resource. Well, this year in the first half he didn't talk to us. Well, that's just because he was off kilter. But he was no different than anybody else on our team. Just the fact is when you're the last line of defense becomes obvious to everyone that you're not playing very well. So we did a number of different things to try to get him to get his game back. You know, no different than dealing with your kids. You can talk all you want. But until they're ready to listen, until they're ready to get it going themselves it's not going to happen. Ozzie would be a great one to tell you he'll be fine, he'll be fine, he'll be fine. But as a Coach, sometimes that's not enough. You know, and as a manager, sometimes that's not enough. You've actually got to see the results. I thought he had about ten games left, might have been before that, the results started to show, and he's carried on through the playoffs. Q. You mentioned Dan Bylsma a few minutes ago, before anyone knew this match-up was going to happen, if you asked him who some of the coaches around in hockey that he talked to or bounced things off of, your name would always be one of the first ones to come up. Can you talk about what those talks were about? How technical were this he? How much were they about teaching, and do you regret any of the things you might have taught him to this point? COACH BABCOCK: No, none whatsoever as far as regrets go. Dan played for me a couple of years, and Dan was a real important part of our team. We went to the finals with Anaheim, he was a guy who was a heart-and-soul guy, a good teammate, a positive person. And he made his teammates better. After he was done playing, he was an assistant coach on our minor league team. We talked a number of times and he wanted the job in grand rapids. You know, I think we've talked periodically since that time. But the reason Dan's doing a good job is not because he talked to Mike Babcock or not because he played for Andy Murray or played for me, it's because he's a good person. He works hard, and he has a passion for the game. Now he's sharing that with his players. So I just think he's an intelligent guy. He's a good family guy, and he's worked hard over a long period of time. And maximized his potential as a player and now as a coach to get this opportunity. He gets full marks for it. Q. You were pretty pointed in your comments the other day about having to play four games in six days. Have you thought about it anymore, any advantage at all to one team or the other with the compressed schedule? COACH BABCOCK: No, just the thing for me, the great thing about it is they don't ask me. It's kind of like refereeing, they don't ask me about that either. But it just seems to me we have two of the greatest teams in the world, star power-wise for the game. I don't think we need 14 days off. But there's a reason the NFL who, in my opinion is the biggest promotional horse maybe besides NASCAR in sport, takes two weeks off before the super bowl. It's called to hype it up. Well, that's the part for me that when you -- we had a ton of time -- I mean, I could have went bear hunting every series in between games I told someone today. You know, so I guess the bottom line is we're here, we're ecstatic to be here, and we're excited to be playing the games wherever they're scheduled and whenever they're scheduled (smiling). Q. Can you talk a little about the Zetterberg-Crosby match-up? Zetterberg seemed to get the best of that last year, and just those two? COACH BABCOCK: Well, I think too much is made of it. The Pittsburgh Penguins are going to play against the Detroit Red Wings. Sometimes a lot gets put into an individual match-up that in the end might not be the difference. There's going to be goaltending, there's going to be defense. But I think obviously they're two driven guys. They're going to compete hard against one another or whoever they end up playing against the majority of the time. And I think those are good story lines. I think they're really high end players. I already mentioned Crosby is the face of the league. Zetterberg, if he was from North America would be more so that way. They're both dynamic players and people, and good looking kids. Easy to sell. Q. We watched practice this morning, and Pavel Datsyuk didn't look like he was fully engaged. What is -- can you tell us the difference in your team when he plays and when he doesn't play? What do you have to do? COACH BABCOCK: Well, I mean, when he went play we've got to have someone else hold on to the puck for 18 minutes of the game. Whether he scores or not on, he's still got the puck for about that chunk of time. So it makes it harder for you. But you know, that's why you're on a team. Last series I thought was a good example. We had to pick each other up. That's the beauty of the system, and it doesn't matter if your name's lien owe or Helm or Meech or Chelios. When you get the sweater on you expect to do a job you expect your teammates to be the best they can possibly be. Whoever dresses tomorrow that's what we expect the same. You know, I think it's been a real good opportunity. It's been a coming out party a little bit for a guy like Helm. I think Ericsson's done a really good job for us at playoff time here. And someone else is going to have an opportunity on either team or other people will have an opportunity to step to the forefront in this series. To me that's what sport is all about. That's what makes it fun. Q. You said that the Penguins are similar in some ways to last year, different in some ways. Can you elaborate on the ways they're different with Bylsma now? COACH BABCOCK: No. I don't want to, Is that how's that? Is that all right (smiling)? They've got different people, how's that? No, I mean, I guess what I would say to you is that I think they do some things technically a little bit different than they did in the past. Yeah, and they've changed some players. Q. You touched on this, but every year it seems like this team has a player or two that was a support player the previous year that the next year starts scoring some big goals. Last year was Samuelsson, and Stuart, for instance, and now Helm. Is that just part of the greatness of this organization that keeps churning these people out or do they surprise you sometimes with all the star power the way they can step forward? COACH BABCOCK: I don't know about star power. I think that may be a little stretching it. Star power is year after year after year. So that's why people like Zetterberg and Datsyuk and Lidstrom and Crosby and Malkin. But I think guys can step up and really show that they're playoff performers and guys who can bring it at the right time of year. The more depth you have, the better off you are. I think obviously we've been fortunate managing the cap that we've been able to keep good players in the minor ons long enough for them to grow up. You have a way better chance if you're lien owe and if you're Erikson and you're 25 than if you do if you're 18 or 19. The other thing is when you arrive in the league at 18 and 19, that means your three years are up at 21. And that means you're negotiating again. What we tend to do in the early -- because we overpay these players way before they earn it, and that effects the next team. So we try not to do that in Detroit. Q. In what ways does Nick help you try to slow down Malkin and/or Crosby in a given game and how much does he help your power play? COACH BABCOCK: Obviously, Nick's one of the greatest players in the world. He's really going to help. The way they roll through it with basically what they're doing is with using the guys on the fourth line as well, what we'll do is we won't have a specific Nick and Raffy against one group. We'll have Nick, Raffy, stewy, and Krohner against two groups in the third or in the fourth group if that makes any sense. Q. Last year you came into the finals with a vast edge and experience. You still have that. But can one year of them reaching the finals last year be enough to somewhat neutralize that? COACH BABCOCK: I think the experience now because they've been through it, I mean, we're all the same that way to me. You know, I wouldn't play a whole bunch on that. And you know the guys they've added, I think the guys they've added in Kuhn its and guerin, and guys like that have helped them that way, too. Guerin's a mature player. Kuhn its has won the cup, Fleury's been through it before. So to me all those things are pretty much a soft, now we just play. Q. What have you learned personally as a coach in two previous trips to the cup final that maybe you didn't know going into it? COACH BABCOCK: Well, I think that just the thing in itself that I can sit here and tell you that the finals are way different than the regular playoff, I think is one. The other thing is that as much as everyone's going to talk about momentum after one game and all, I don't buy any of that. We're just going to play the games. But I also, you know, the thing that stands out in my mind to me being through it before is just how hard it is to win. Hard to get here, and it's hard to win. One day you're going to feel like a million Bucks and the next day you're going to feel like your heart is ripped out of your chest. That's just the way it is. But that's what makes it so much much fun. One of these teams is going to be just get the ride of their life. Besides family things, it's the most fun you can ever have in your whole life to win that great trophy, to touch it, to have your name printed on it, to share it with your family and the community and the people that have helped you along the way. So to me that's a great thing, and I don't think a thing you can ever get enough of. End of FastScripts |
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