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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: BRUINS v CANUCKSMay 31, 2011Pete ChiarelliClaude JulienVANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA: Practice Day THE MODERATOR: Questions for Claude and Peter. Q. Claude, we talked about this at the start of the Eastern Conference Finals. Are you concerned about the power-play? I know you're doing lots. Do you expect to do anything different in this series that you may think help you break through? COACH JULIEN: Well, we made some adjustment late in the last series. You saw us put Zdeno up front. We certainly made some little tweaks here and there hoping to be able to turn the corner on that. Again, I think at the beginning of the playoffs, we felt like if we couldn't get our power-play going, we were in big trouble. But here we are in the finals, so we've managed to survive. We understand if your power-play doesn't get going, you're certainly playing with fire. But having said that, I think it's going to be important for us to be extremely disciplined and try and minimize the penalties we take, because they do have a good power-play. At the same time your penalty killers are going to have to do a great job. We've been able to balance that out, especially the last series. Tampa Bay had a really good power-play coming in. Our special teams managed somehow to stay close there till Game 6 where they broke through, and obviously Game 7 with none of those being a factor. Q. How impressed are you with Milan and the way he handles the spotlight, pressure games? PETER CHIARELLI: Well, we've seen in Milan when he was a junior how he handled pressure games with that challenge series and with the Giants. We've seen him prior to this year in the playoffs, clutch goals, being a factor, a physical factor. He's starting to come around in the playoffs now. I don't think there would be any other thing greater than being in Vancouver to motivate him. I don't think we'll have to worry about that. He handles himself. He's a mature kid for being kind of a playful kid. He handles himself well. When we were here earlier in the winter, when we were leaving, he had a cheering section by the bus about a thousand strong. He knows he's under certain pressures here but he embraces them. He's an enthusiastic player and he enjoys the pressure. He's showed that he can play under the pressure. Q. Peter, Milan is not the only guy with local connections. You have Mark Recchi, Cam Neely calls this city home, Scott Bradley is from the lower mainland. You've talked to all of them. How special a moment is this for members of the Bruins family that are coming home for a Stanley Cup final appearance? PETER CHIARELLI: I've talked to all of them at different times about coming here to play, even when we came back later in the winter. They all get really juiced up about playing here, and their ticket requests are huge also. They call this God's Country. I think each of them have told me that. We're happy to be here to play obviously in the Stanley Cup final. But it's obviously special for each of those guys in their own way. I'm glad there's some consolation to playing here. That's it for these guys. Q. Claude, would you just describe your friendship with Alain. Have you spoken to him in the lead-up to this final? How will this affect your friendship with him? COACH JULIEN: Well, I don't think it's going to affect our friendship. It might affect it for a couple of weeks. Rightfully so. No, I think as far as Alain and I are concerned, we go way back. Again, we're going to try to keep this answer short. But from being teammates in Salt Lake City, to being both from the Ottawa area, him being on the other side of the river, on the Québec side. We built a friendship throughout those years. I think this year, more than any other year, we were very supportive of each other, knowing the demands of both organizations and hoping to have those teams in the Stanley Cup finals. I know Alain had his here in Vancouver. I certainly had mine in Boston. The expectations were very high. I remember at one point saying we hoped to see each other in the Stanley Cup finals, and here we are. I know that throughout the playoffs we were kind of encouraging each other. Now that we've made it here, we've both gone silent and don't plan on talking to each other till it's all over (smiling). Q. Peter, you talked about Milan when you came back a few months ago, the reception he got. I asked him if he would go home. He said he thought it best to stay at the team hotel. Is that coming from within or was it suggested that maybe he should stay at the hotel? PETER CHIARELLI: You'd have to talk to the boss here. COACH JULIEN: This is something we do. We as a team stay at the hotel, we stay together as a team. This is what we call a sacrifice for all the right reasons. Everybody has bought into it since day one of the playoffs. It wasn't even an issue. He wants to be with the team. He knows that his family understands the demands and the sacrifices you have to make at this point. Hasn't been an issue. Certainly won't be moving forward. Q. Peter, do you look at last year's Cup final being a fluke situation with the goalies and you need a Tim Thomas to get to the finals at this time? PETER CHIARELLI: History shows both sides of that. Sometimes teams try to copy the Stanley Cup finalists the following year, subsequent years. We've seen teams before without star goaltenders win Cups. Tim is a terrific goaltender and he's a clutch goaltender. He's won championships before. I wouldn't call last year a fluke. I think you'll probably see it again at some point. You're going to be more certain to have a proven goaltender. I think history will show that also. Q. We talked about Tim Thomas. How would you characterize his play throughout these entire playoffs? Does he have to steal this series more than he's called on so far in this journey? PETER CHIARELLI: I think I've been asked this question a few times. I often bring up Grant Fuhr. You've seen him in the past win series, win games, sometimes win games by letting in five goals, but making seven lip-standing saves. Tim has shown us a lot of that. I've seen the comments after these games, justifiable so, where he may have let in two or three soft ones. Every time he'll come back and there will be a clutch time at the end of the game where he'll make two or three terrific saves that will win the game for us. Generally speaking, I would characterize his game for these playoffs as outstanding. You're going to see goals here or there, but as you know he's a competitive kid, younger man. We'll worry about that descriptor later. He's a competitive competitor. He wants to win. Q. Regarding Tyler Seguin, what kind of luxury is it to have someone so skilled in your bottom six? Peter, what do you see out of him in the future, having been able to add him this year? COACH JULIEN: Well, first of all, I'd say to characterize him saying in our bottom six, probably the only reason he's there right now is his age and maybe his lack of experience. I don't think he's going to be a bottom six for very long. We all see the potential. We all see what he has to offer. Speed-wise, skill-wise, everything else. Is it a luxury? Absolutely. I think anybody who witnessed him when he came into our lineup knows how much of a luxury he is. PETER CHIARELLI: Going forward, I mean, his skill set is in the top 5% of the league I think now. As Claude mentions, there has to be a level of maturity. We're seeing that right now. We're seeing it throughout the playoffs. We're going to continue to see it throughout the summer and in subsequent seasons. He accepts what is delivered to him as far as his playing assignments, as far as what he has to do to get better. He's continuing to get better, as I said, day to day. Someone with his skill set and his speed and his sense and vision, he's going to be a top-line forward in fairly short order. Q. Obviously it's a team game. There's one-on-one individual battles within that. How much are you looking forward to the potential battle between Patrice and Ryan Kesler, given their skill sets, that they'll end up being on the ice against each other? COACH JULIEN: Well, you know, I don't know if it's a key to having success. I have a feeling that Kesler is not going to necessarily be looking at Bergeron much unless it's those big faceoffs at key times. Somehow I have the feeling that both coaches will probably look for something else. If it isn't, then so be it. But I think when you look at those two players, what they bring to their team are very similar. Patrice has done everything for our team that Kesler has done for his. There's no doubt that you have two players here that are key to their team, guys that you can use in all kinds of situations. For us, it's keying on Patrice being as good as he can be. As I mentioned before, it will be interesting to see the difference between those two, what they bring to the game in these finals. PETER CHIARELLI: Again, I don't know how Claude is going to play Patrice's line. I think you guys can figure that out. I can't say enough of Patrice's two-way game, his strength on the puck, his faceoffs are very important. I think in that last series, whatever team won the most faceoffs won the game. He's obviously a big factor in this series. For him to come back the way he came back, start the Tampa series, two games into the Tampa series, and play the way he's played, I think that speaks volumes. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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