NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: HURRICANES v RED WINGS

June 6, 2002

Scotty Bowman

COACH BOWMAN: I don't think so. I think it will be pretty much the same.

COACH BOWMAN: There's always critical games. I think they get stronger as the series goes on. But, you know, there is a time when you run out of games. But the second game can often be a swing-game. Obviously with Vancouver, they won it and we knew that going in there we really had our backs against the wall, even though we had one more game we could lose. And with our team, I think -- I don't approach each game -- I look at the game and I say that this is the way we're going to play in the game. But if you worry about the series and everything else, it takes away from how you are going to play.

COACH BOWMAN: We know that they have scored a lot of key goals, and they did it in Game 1 as well. But I think we're not going to go in just with a defensive posture. We have to make sure that we get more scoring chances. That's

going to be our priority, is to try to create some more offense, the right kind of offense. We're a team that's usually been pretty good as a team to shut down other players, and we're certainly not going to put it on one line or anything like that because we'd like to utilize our four lines a little better than we did in Game 1. But we understand why it didn't work out.

COACH BOWMAN: It's always a combination. I think in Game 1 we didn't -- we made some poor plays, but I don't think it was because they just sat back. I mean, they are not a team that just sits back. They forecheck. It wasn't like there -- there was some open ice at center ice, and if you don't put a puck in the guy's stick, probably they are going to get it. They got more guys that are going to be in position to get the puck. So I think our passing skills have to be a lot better. Sometimes when you go in, you press a little bit. The first game of the series you want to play -- and maybe the fact that we had a bit of -- you don't want to have it, but, you know, everything was working in our favor with Game 7 and there was three days in between and, you know, you start comparing your play as it happens to what happened the last game, which is probably the wrong way to do it. But it's also a normal course of events. That's, I think, what happened is we -- we know that we didn't do things in Game 1 that are going to help us win a game, especially in the first period.

COACH BOWMAN: We got six of our eleven chances or twelve, probably to stretch it a bit. We got six chances on the powerplay, scoring chances. We had seven attempts. They had six. I thought we had the puck in their end quite a bit of the time. But I think sometimes, you know, we had a little bit of traffic in front. I don't think we have to change a lot. I mean, we don't have a powerplay that does the same thing all the time. So I don't have any formula that says we have to -- yeah, we would like to do a lot of things differently, but you know, the powerplay, I think you start pressing. You start thinking about it at this time of the year. It's got to come, and we have different looks that we can put together. If it doesn't work, we try to change and we have different things. We go to the umbrella quite a bit or we could go down low. And I think that's the secret after powerplay, is when you do the same thing all the time and it's not working, you got -- if you don't change, it's probably going to really hurt you. We try to make adjustments as the game goes on. But I think it's foolish to go in thinking -- you can end up with a low-penalty game. I mean, I don't think you can go in thinking that -- I didn't think each time was going to get close to ten minutes on the powerplay. But, you know, the first game, they are going to use a lot of stuff they didn't like in the both series that both teams might have done against the opposition. They are going to say we're going to cut it off right now. Even the first penalty they gave to Carolina for obstruction. I think it was Wesley. I think they saw it in the first series that he got involved with Roberts a couple of times. Roberts was punching -- it sort of causes a chain reaction, and it was against Holmstrom, they wanted to make sure he stays on his feet. There's stuff like that. And maybe there was other obstructions later that might have been in somebody's eyes worse, but I didn't think there was that much obstruction. I think sometimes you pay the price to -- it's like we were a man short, we got a second penalty. We were saying well, it was one end, it is that. They are sending messages all the time. The referees, you know, they do what they can to control the game and if you are asking me if there will be 20 minutes as a prediction. I'd say probably not. But if the game gets played differently, which it has a chance to be, I think they have showed both teams that -- they did tell us they are -- they told both teams in the conference the day before that it was going to be a good standard in their opinion, and with two referees you are not going to get away with very much.

COACH BOWMAN: No, you don't know what goes on with -- they have meetings with the officials. They just tell us certain things, if they are not happy with some faceoff plays or they are not happy with some like they are always concerned about scrums, there wasn't any. They try to give you a heads-up. Andy VanHellemond and he's the main guy, Mike Murphy is also there from the hockey department. But Andy meets with the teams and before he meets with the officials and tries to give you a heads-up of what they are going to do. We had no special instructions for this game. He just said that they called a tight standard and they had reason for it, and I mean, he's not even a referee. He goes in and meets them. I am sure they go over the replay. But he said they screened the tape pretty closely, and I -- I mean, you know, I feel that -- you can't get any better supervision than Andy. He was a top referee, and he says it like it is. He just said that they didn't see anything in the game that they had to alert us to for individual players.

COACH BOWMAN: No, we have been doing this since the start of the Playoffs. There's certain instances where they might want to -- if they didn't skate the day before, they may want to go on. Some guys might want to change up their routine. It's mainly an individual routine, and we don't put a lot of onus on the morning skate. Basically it's a personal choice.