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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: PENGUINS v RED WINGS

June 5, 2009

Mike Babcock

DETROIT, MICHIGAN: Practice Day

Q. Two questions on Marian Hossa. How do you feel about where he's at in terms of level of his play and what he's doing? And secondly, is there something that you've seen that maybe explains why his point production is different last year during the playoffs than this year?
COACH BABCOCK: Well, you know, I think for starters, him and Pav got off to a tough start in the playoffs and didn't go good. And then that guy named Pav isn't here. I don't know if you've noticed that. So that affects lots of things. It affects lots of people. And it's been harder for him.
Saying all that, though, here we are. We're in the best of three with two games at home, and we're pretty excited about our opportunity. So I think it's always good to evaluate these things at the end and see how they actually went (smiling).

Q. Can you talk about Pavel's availability for Game 5 and if you expect him to play?
COACH BABCOCK: He'll play.

Q. You guys have struggled a little bit on the power play and the penalty kill. What do you attribute to that?
COACH BABCOCK: Well, I guess, let's give their power play credit and their penalty kill credit. I thought we were awful on the power play last night. I thought it sucked the life right out of us. In saying that, you know, it's like anything is, that we had a big opportunity to go up 3-1 in the hockey game. And suddenly the game's 2-2, and then 3-2 before you even recover from that situation.
So it was a big momentum thing. It's been a big part of the series. They're winning the specialty teams battle to this point four games in. And it's allowed them to have success in two of the four games.

Q. I thought Anaheim had a small measure of success against you guys at times with their forecheck trying to play physical and pound your "D". Do you think maybe Pittsburgh's trying to pick up on a bit of that and follow that recipe?
COACH BABCOCK: Yeah, I think so. And I think when you don't manage the puck well, at times, it's very effective. I think when you manage the puck well, it's not very effective.
So when I go through each and every game like you do, they've been real effective with their times. At times, we've been all over them, too. So that's one of those things. It's whether it takes 50 minutes or 60 minutes. Sorry, whether it takes 60 or 65, you've got to play the whole thing.
I didn't think that was the case in last night's game at all. I thought we had the game well in control. I thought we had the puck a lot for a chunk period of time. We've talked about it already. On the power play we shot ourselves in the foot and went from there.
I think they've had some guys do a good job on their forecheck. But we went through it this morning and showed our guys some clips that if we executed it all in these situations here, and I'm not trying to take away anything they're doing on the forecheck, but if you make some good plays, there's no forecheck.

Q. In your mind what is the key to regaining some momentum and setting a pace that you feel more comfortable with in this Game 5?
COACH BABCOCK: Winning.

Q. Within the game?
COACH BABCOCK: I knew what your question was, yes (smiling). You know, it's interesting. And I said this to the players, too. If you listen to what people on the outside say, Pittsburgh was done after two games. I don't think anybody in our locker room thought that. Now if you listen to what people on the outside say, the Red Wings are done after two games. So I don't think that's what we think.
What we think is we've got the best of 2 in our building that we're going to come here tomorrow and play well.
The other thing is that I thought our team after they got up 4-2, I mean, we had a push, but we didn't have energy. You know, is that because we're worn right out? Or is that because it happens all the time, when one team scores a few goals, bang, bang, bang, the other team doesn't have as much energy and the other team gets more excited. We're going to find this all out tomorrow.

Q. You said that Datsyuk was going to be back in with regard to the power play or penalty kill. Is he a guy that can maybe help those units being that they're struggling right now?
COACH BABCOCK: Well, you know, first thing is prior to yesterday's game, we were hoping Pav was going to be in, but we weren't planning. Now we're hoping Pav's going to be in and we're planning that he's going to be in. But he's still got to be in.
Then the second thing is how does he do when he gets out there? You missed a chunk of time. Is he capable of those situations? Is he playing on the wing or is he playing in the middle? You know, all those things. We'll see. I don't know the answer, and I'm being honest with you, just because until I see them play, I won't know.

Q. It's no secret most coaches will try to take the best players of the other team out of the equation if they can. Do you sense that they are targeting Nick back there with the hits and on the forecheck and trying to -- he was by far not your biggest culprit in terms of turnovers last night. But are they trying to make an impression on him?
COACH BABCOCK: I would think they are. I would think every team we've played does the same thing. I don't think it's any surprise. But that was one of the things I tried to say, is that if you execute, those things don't happen to you as much. If you don't execute, you get a bad overpass from your partner and it's in your feet instead of on your stick. Then suddenly you get hit. Lots of times you don't get hit. So to me, that happened, I thought, too many times last night in last night's game.

Q. The words, you know, the media's all talking and you've seen it on TV, we're talking about the Wings look tired and this young Pittsburgh club has found another gear. And maybe Detroit doesn't have that next gear. Is it fair after all this team's done and the way you've positioned yourself that all of a sudden people turn the page on you maybe a little bit too quick?
COACH BABCOCK: I think you're allowed to say whatever you want. You guys write the stuff. That's fair to me. I've got no problem. They won the last two games. You know, we're probably getting a little too much credit after we won two games.
But that's not going to win the series. You know, they're going to win the series or we're going to win the series, and it's not going to be based on what people speculate. It's going to be based on what we do or what they do. So we'll see what happens.

Q. When it comes to Malkin and Crosby, what is sort of the greatest challenge as a defensive unit to try to control them? Because you've done a good job on Sidney from a scoreboard standpoint. But then last night both of them got going.
COACH BABCOCK: Well, I thought they had a good game, but he also thought we turned the puck over. If you look at the goals they scored, we turned the puck over big time. So I don't think it's any different than Datsyuk and Zetterberg. The only thing is we haven't had Datsyuk that way so they've been able to isolate on one guy more so than the other.
The way they play them, sometimes they've got them together, they've got them apart sometimes. But they're really high-end players.
I don't think you can cancel them out for the whole series. But I think you can make it as hard as possible on them. The other thing is one of the keys to our success during the regular season or all the time on the road is depth.
So match-ups aren't as big a deal. But suddenly when you take some people out of the lineup, now home ice is more important for you, because match-ups are a bigger deal for you. I don't know if that makes sense.

Q. I know every year, every team is different every year, but when you look at other years where Detroit won, the grind line, Maltby, McCarty, Draper played such a big role. Even last year you had Drake, you had Lilja in the back end. Is your team different that way that you don't have that level of sand paper to respond?
COACH BABCOCK: I think what happens is I can see where you're going with this here (smiling). I think actually with everybody in their right spot, we do have a fair bit of that. But I think when people aren't in the right spot, sometimes we don't have as much as we'd like to have.
But I also think in the last couple of games they've had more of it than us. That's why we're going to play tomorrow.
You know, and I'm not trying to avoid any questions anyone asks me, but I'm a big believer in us. So they've won two games. Let's come to the rink tomorrow, let's get ready to play. We'll be all right.

Q. Just with the way Malkin's playing, too. Do you need Pav's defensive abilities right now more than anything else?
COACH BABCOCK: Well, we'd like Pav to have the puck for 18 or 20 minutes like he normally does. That's a great concept. When he has the puck, they don't have it. It's not even playing defense, you just have the puck. You don't have to worry about it. Plus you're faster coming out of your scone. You're faster for the neutral zone. He is up for the Hart Trophy, too.
But, and I've said this many times during the playoff run, the greatest thing about this trophy is how hard it is. And when you have injuries, it's harder. Suck it up and find a way to win. Who cares. No one cares except about the team who wins in the end. You get your name on that thing, it's the greatest summer of your life. That's still our plan.

Q. I don't know how to follow that up?
COACH BABCOCK: Oh, good, that would be perfect. (Laughing).

Q. With Tomas Holmstrom, he looked very engaged last night getting involved with Fleury. But he can't seem to find a goal. Is there any concern or not because he's been there done that and he'll be there as the series starts to wind?
COACH BABCOCK: I think there was always some concern. He was taking some ribbing in the room the other day are you ever going to get your stick on one? That's just the way it goes in our room. We'd like to get him to score some. Actually I think Fleury got engaged with him, if you look at it. Anyway, you need him to get his stick on one. We need him to tip one in on the power play. We need him to get the puck back on the power play.
To me the biggest difference between our power play and their power play, we're one and done, and they're one and on it and get it back. Pretty straightforward to me.
So that's a simple thing. That's one of Tommy's greatest skills. As much as tipping it, we've got to get the puck back and do a better job of that as a group.

End of FastScripts

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