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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: LIGHTNING v BRUINS

May 15, 2011

Guy Boucher

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS: Practice Day

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Coach Guy Boucher.

Q. You mentioned last night about maintaining composure. Why is that important for your team to not get caught up and stay within yourself and don't let emotions take over?
COACH BOUCHER: Well, I think it's important for any team. It's important to know who you play also and what their habits are and what can come at us, and it's something that we were ready for, whether it's in the first series or second series.
But it's something we talked about all year long. So it's an ongoing process from day one, and we like our guys to be totally focused and that means that you're going to take a lot of shots.

Q. Traditionally in the Playoffs there's what I call a good karma team, a team that seems to grow in confidence and believing in themselves. They start out in the Playoffs, it may be slow and then all of a sudden they just build and keep going and going. Does this team feel that it's gaining in confidence every time they go out and play? Do you feel like this team is in that kind of rhythm?
COACH BOUCHER: I think Boston and us are in the same boat. I think they gained confidence in their first series, and they came back from a two-game deficit and won their second series against a top seed in four. So I don't see any difference between us and them.

Q. In regards to the Milan Lucic crosscheck on Victor Hedman, one of the Bruins players today said that Hedman deserved it. How do you respond to that and is it something you want the League to take a look at?
COACH BOUCHER: The League said they were going to take a look at all head shots. That was definitely a head shot. I'm sure they're looking at it.

Q. And your response?
COACH BOUCHER: I don't have a response. The League knows what they're doing and they've had a lot to deal with during the year and in the Playoffs and they've got their standards. And we're going to see what the reaction is.

Q. Opportunistic, that's something that coaches throughout the course of the season want their players to be. But do you find that it's particularly important at this stage of the game? Obviously on the first three goals your guys were very opportunistic.
COACH BOUCHER: I think every time you score a goal, I think that's the definition of scoring goals, is bury your opportunity. So most of the time you say that when you don't get a lot of opportunity and you score. On most of them, you get six and you score four, and you're considered an opportunistic team. I.
Think yesterday we got our fair share of major quality chances. And some of them we put in, but a lot of them, I think Thomas made incredible saves on.
So I just think that our guys have developed a way to play, and we're expecting our players to bury it when it's time to bury it, and there's different ways that we've done it, and hopefully we can keep on doing that.
But like I said yesterday, I'm expecting Tim Thomas to play his best game of the Playoffs in the next game, and I'll be shocked if he wasn't.
We're not kidding ourselves. Even if we're opportunistic, it's going to be very, very difficult to beat them next game.

Q. The other day you used the phrase emotional gauge. How important is it that you guys have seemed to learn to control your emotion, and how important is that in your structure of how to play?
COACH BOUCHER: Well, for our particular group, because it's not always the same, I've coached years where you had a very emotional group, and you coach them a certain way.
And I've coached other years where you get more cerebral guys. And we've got a hard-working bunch of guys that like the Xs and Os and always want to know more. And I found that when we get out of our emotional poise, we don't play as well.
And we talk about motivation, but I don't believe in motivation. I believe in activation. So we want to activate the right stuff so that we get the right result and the right response on the ice, and that means that when we're too emotional, we don't play very well. So it's important for us to gauge that.

Q. Your team that is committed to blocking shots. When you see the likes of Steven Stamkos and Marty St. Louis diving the blocked shots, what does that do you for you as a coaching staff and in your dressing room?
COACH BOUCHER: It's something that every coach wants, but in reality, that's a process. These guys always feel that they're expected to score goals and play like stars, but I think there's a big difference between being a star and being a winner. And guys like Vinnie and St. Louis, they've won the Stanley Cup before and they know what it takes. A guy like Stamkos is learning how to play in those adversity moments, and that means that it's all about the details.
If you look at who scored the goals yesterday, it wasn't them. But to me, blocking a shot is just as good as scoring a goal, because you've prevented one and you've created an atmosphere and you've created standards that everybody has to follow.
When it starts with your skill guys blocking shots, it trickles down real quick to everybody else. And as a coach, there's nothing more inspiring than those guys doing that kind of job.

Q. It seems like every one of your players that we've talked to throughout the Playoffs always keep saying: We're not done yet. Here you've won eight in a row. They seem confident, but not cocky. Is that just the players or does that come from you constantly teaching them, getting on them: Hey, we got another game?
COACH BOUCHER: I think it's everybody's responsibility, whether it's the players or the coach, or the trainers. It's everybody as part of the staff, I think, to follow great examples that we've got at the top of the pyramid. We've got Mr. Vinik and Mr. Yzerman who are the most humble people I've met.
We feel that with humility comes great preparation. And we haven't done anything yet, and we believe it. It's not something that we face and want to look humble.
It's the reality as we won one game in the series and we could lose four in a row, because that team has done it against Montreal. They were down by two, now they're only down by one.
And they've been a terrific team all year long. Their goaltender's outstanding. They've got guys who can score. So they can take over this series anytime. And we want to make sure that we realize that.

Q. I was talking to Eric Brewer, and he talked about sort of the idea of rolling the dice at the trade deadline. You never know what you're going to get, how you're going to fit it, what it's going to be like. And I wonder if there are things that surprise you about his game and maybe how he's evolved and the kinds of roles you've put him in, or whether this was the plan all the way along when you and Steve talked about, okay, what are you going to do at the deadline?
COACH BOUCHER: Were you saying Brewer?

Q. Eric.
COACH BOUCHER: We knew we had a hole to fill. We knew that probably since day one. To be able to fill it, though, in the middle of the year, we thought it was going to be impossible.
I think that being able to get Brewer was exactly what we needed. We needed somebody that was going to be able to log a lot of minutes, have the speed to play against top lines that are fast, have the size to play against bigger lines, be able to play in the power play and the penalty kill and have leadership.
So if you put that down as a shopping list, that's a pretty big shopping list that chances are you're not going to be able to fill. And obviously Mr. Yzerman has done an incredible job at being able to bring in this player that's made a tremendous impact on our team.
But working with Steve now, I don't talk about rolling dices anymore. He thinks of everything long and hard, and it's not that everything is going to work, but everything has a pretty good chance of turning out at least positively. And in this case, it's more than positive; it was a great impact on our team.

Q. At the end of that game, Boston down, no chance to win; they came after you guys. You didn't retaliate. Do you look at what Boston did there, yeah, they could say that they're sending a message for the next game or the series or whatever, but is that a sign of weakness on their part and a sign of strength on your part for not retaliating?
COACH BOUCHER: I can't talk for them. They control the way they want to do things. I was asked a question after the game, why we didn't put our top players on that five-on-three. My answer is very simple. One is injuries. We didn't want any injuries. And, two, we want to respect the opponent.

Q. Obviously Bergenheim has got a lot of attention for the goals he's scored, but what do you feel about what Dominic Moore has done on that line, and overall, like he's all over the ice with what he's been able to do?
COACH BOUCHER: Dominic Moore is, I guess I would describe him as the ghost on that line. He does everything but Bergenheim will get the credit and Downie will get the credit. And then when you look at the clips, you realize that a big portion of whatever is successful starts with Dominic Moore.
So it's not surprising to me. I mean that's why we brought him in. Last year I felt he was one of the better players for Montreal in the Playoffs. I liked him during the season, too.
He's just continuing doing what I feel fits exactly in what we want to do with this team, and so he's been very consistent. I think in his case, more than most of our players, there's a consistency there you can rely on every game, whether it's offensively and defensively. And he's been a big part of the culture of the team.
And you know, we're talking about humility, he's one of those guys. He'll never take credit for anything. But in the background, there's a lot of credit that's due to him for sure.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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