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NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: BRUINS v CANUCKSJune 2, 2011Jannik HansenMax LapierreSami SaloVANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA: Practice Day THE MODERATOR: Questions for Jannik, Sami and Max. Q. Max, Alex said that's how French guys show respect for one another, putting the finger in the mouth. Do you agree? MAX LAPIERRE: I'm not going to comment on that. I have to focus on the ice. I'm not going to start a war. Q. (Question regarding Alex in the lineup.) MAX LAPIERRE: He's been playing great since the beginning of the season, so we're pretty happy. Q. Jannik, what do you think when some guys on the team call you the best practice player on the team? Bieksa said that yesterday. Is there a surprise when you can play the type of game you played last night? Does that surprise some of the opponents because they're looking out for the Sedins or Kesler and you have that type of night? JANNIK HANSEN: I don't know about the first part there. I think it's just a matter of trying to do your best every day. Obviously you build a foundation in practice, and you try to carry that over to the game. No, it's obviously big when we can get three lines going or four, six Ds. It makes it harder for whoever we're playing to contain us. If we get contributions from every guy in the lineup, we're pretty good. Q. Can all of you address how the speed in your lineup affects your game and how that can be trouble for the Bruins if you impose that on them. MAX LAPIERRE: I think speed is obvious in our game. We want to play a high-paced, fast-tempo game, get everybody into the game, all six Ds, all the lines. It's caused every team in the league trouble. That's just a part of our game. Q. Sami, obviously with the star forwards you guys have, a lot of attention is on them on the offensive side of it. Do you feel a little underappreciated? Talk about the pride you take in the team defense. SAMI SALO: Yeah, I think everybody takes pride in their defense, not just the Ds, but the forwards. That's a core part of our game, is playing very well as a five-man unit defensively, then you get the chances offensively. Q. Jannik, I'm sure you're in touch regularly with your family and friends in Denmark. Is the Stanley Cup playoffs generating a lot more attention in your home country than maybe it has in the past? JANNIK HANSEN: Yeah, for sure. Obviously it creates a little more attention to it. They're starting to show the games now on the channels as well. It's definitely drawn attention. Q. Jannik and Max, it was said that Tim Thomas was initiating contact with you. How do you avoid running into him when he's outside the blue paint? JANNIK HANSEN: Obviously he plays a little further out than other goalies we've seen. Again, we can't take runs at him even though he's outside. It's a matter of being careful. If he's out there, there should be room around him and behind him. So it's something we can take advantage of, as well. Q. Sami, in your long career in the context of what happened last night between Bergeron and Burrows, can you recall something whacky that's happened in a scrum, something that you recall with a bit of humor that happened? SAMI SALO: That kind of stuff is part of hockey. There's a lot of emotion out there. That was just another scrum that we've seen in all of our three series before. Nothing more than that. Q. Max, can you go through what you've learned about Jannik, playing with him. Describe some of the little things he's able to do. MAX LAPIERRE: I guess he's our best practice player, so it's fun practicing with him (laughter). No, he and Raffi are working hard every game. They're smart players on the ice. They're always on the good position. I'm just enjoying my time right now. Big plays again from them last night. It makes my job way easier. Q. You guys won all four Game 1s so far in the playoffs. What has made you so prepared or given you that success in the first game of every series? SAMI SALO: It's tough to pinpoint. Obviously we prepared ourselves very well before each series. The focus has been trying to put our best game on the ice from the first game, get everybody settled in. It hasn't been anything else really. Q. Sami, can you talk about the challenges of Zdeno Chara being in front on the power-play? SAMI SALO: Well, obviously at 6'9", there's not many players in the league that can move him. Our focus has been to try to leave him, try to take away the passing lanes, trying to block some shots. Q. Jannik and Sami, when you were growing up, what was your first real contact with the Stanley Cup, your first memory? I assume the World Championships were a bigger deal. JANNIK HANSEN: I think not until I came over here and spent my first year in the Western Hockey League, kind of saw the playoffs unfold. I would say fairly late, actually. SAMI SALO: Yeah, for me it was probably the late '80s, when I was 14 or 15, when players like Jari Kurri were in it. Back then there weren't any games on TV. It was mostly highlights, just seeing it on the paper. That's about it. Q. (Question regarding the line.) JANNIK HANSEN: Yeah, you can say we fill different roles, but we play the same style and have the same mentality: getting pucks in deep, getting in on the forecheck, finishing the check, taking pucks to the night. Playing with Max and Raffi, they're two bigger guys that like to throw their body around as well as quite a bit of speed, too. It's a lot of different aspects. But just the fact that we're able to get in on the forecheck, making Ds look around us, Where are they coming from now, maybe rush a play a little more than they wanted to in the first place. Q. Can you talk about the evolution of your game, when you realized you had to play that way to stay in this league? JANNIK HANSEN: Yeah, I got a couple wake-up calls. Obviously not being in a lineup is a big one. But Mike Keane and Scott Arniel down in Manitoba hinted strongly I should definitely work on a defensive game, making sure I can play in my own end as well, being physical. It just kind of carried over toward my year here that that's the type of style they wanted me to play. Q. The physical part? JANNIK HANSEN: Obviously, that too. You can always control how you're skating and finishing your checks. That's an easy part of the game. Q. Sami, with Dan Hamhuis getting hurt last night, can you talk about your defensive depth being challenged again? SAMI SALO: Yeah, well, it's obviously nothing new this year. I think we've gone through 14 defensemen. It obviously shows the depth of this team. Everybody's comfortable playing really with anybody. Dan is obviously a big part of this team, but other guys stepped in big-time last night. Q. Can you give us a sense of what development is like in Denmark? JANNIK HANSEN: Yeah, I think it started about 10 years ago with myself and my age group were the first kind of players that they started a new development program. They brought in a couple Swedish coaches who brought the Swedish style to Denmark, the work ethic they brought with it. You're seeing the fruit of that now with myself, Frans, Peter, so on, Lars Eller of the Maple Leafs coming through. I think we've just seen the start of it because younger and younger players are leaving Denmark earlier than we did to test themselves and so on. Yeah, they're definitely getting better. You see that in the draft, as well. It's not late-rounders. It's early-rounders now and first-rounders we're getting. Q. Jannik, you touched on the evolution. What was it like for you when you were told that you need to really do this if you want to play here? What thoughts went through your mind at that time? I assume you thought you were doing all right. JANNIK HANSEN: Change. Obviously if you want to play on a team that's going to be competitive and compete for the Cup, you need to fill whatever role is given to you. You look at our lineup, there's only so many players that can play on the first and second line. If you don't have the skills that they do, you have to find a different way to contribute. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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