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NHL EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: DEVILS v RANGERSMay 22, 2012Bryce SalvadorNEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: Practice Day Q. Bryce, what did it mean when you saw your coach so emotionally involved on the bench like that in the third period? BRYCE SALVADOR: I think it just shows how much emotional everybody is, right, at this point in the season. And just the whole team is engaged. Q. I was looking at your series in the past, and your best season is 16 points in the NHL. You already have ten points in the Playoffs. What is your secret right now? BRYCE SALVADOR: If I knew I wouldn't tell anybody anyways. I think what we're seeing is just the team's getting rewarded as a whole just for (lost audio). Q. Bryce, how much are you enjoying this? I don't know if you've had a run like this, maybe in your first year in the league you did. But just the whole run and after what you went through last year, is this anything that you could have, could you have hoped for more? BRYCE SALVADOR: Obviously it's been a great experience just from where I was last year. It's been one of those things I'm definitely enjoying. Anytime you get an opportunity to have some success in the Playoffs and an opportunity to maybe have some great success, it's an experience that every player wants. But we're all trying to be careful, especially myself, not trying to get too far ahead of ourselves. The series is tied 2‑2 and there's still a lot of hockey to play. But it's definitely nice to be still playing this time of year compared to where I was last year in May and thinking about the road I had ahead of me. Q. Where were you in May last year, were you already in Minnesota? BRYCE SALVADOR: Just gotten to Minnesota. Started skating and training again. Q. What do you like about playing for Peter DeBoer and why do you think you guys have excelled so much under him? BRYCE SALVADOR: The main thing is the way he's able to communicate. He's a very good communicator with the message he wants to instill, and from what I've seen this year is he really truly believes in his systems and his concepts. While he's open to suggestions, but he really believes in his game plan. And sometimes you have coaches when they want to try to implement the system, when things don't go well, they panic and they give up in what their beliefs were and they try to change things to please everybody else. And we didn't see that. I think throughout the season the pressure system that we play, the offensive zone, and getting the defense to be more involved in the pitching and playing live in the offensive zone, it was a learning experience for us, and I think especially in the defensive zone, there's not‑‑ I don't think there's probably any other team that really plays the aggressive system we have. So it's a big learning experience, even for myself to have to kind of change the way I play in the offensive zone is a big adjustment. And like I said you just gotta give him credit that he had the patience and the belief to stick it out and then once we are starting the success we had from it, it was an easy sell going forward. Q. Just to follow that, you've been traditionally defensive‑oriented team, at least the franchise has. How difficult was that transition to go to a more of an aggressive style offensively? BRYCE SALVADOR: Offensively and defensively, because both sides, like I said, some of the things we do in the defensive zone are really uncharacteristic of defensive play but the results are successful, and then in the offensive zone the ability to pitch a lot more and jump in the play, like I said, that's a little bit of something that is not too characteristic in the Devils system, just allowing every player to do it. Obviously you have the Niedermayers, those type of players, Rafalskis, those type of guys they played great offensive style regardless of the system that they're playing under. But I think that allows us to play a consistent game and I think it allows us to establish a forecheck, especially in the offensive zone. I think you're able to get shots on net, keep the pucks alive, keep plays going. It allows our forwards to eat up more time in the offensive zone and our forwards we got four great lines that can roll in. And the more time we can be in the offensive zone, the better. Q. After everything that happened in that last game, third period and throughout the game, is there any way to tell and what do you anticipate for the next game? Are the stakes too high? Does it all get toned down? Does it get even worse? Or higher intensity? BRYCE SALVADOR: I think intensity will continue to rise throughout the remainder of the Playoffs. I think each game just means that much more. And I know you hear me say it all the time, we saw in the Phillies series, the team that's going to be the most composed I think is going to have the most success. And that's what we're really trying to do. And you never like to‑‑ you don't like to see a play where your goalie is taking a sucker punch but now is not the time of the season to be responding to it. And potentially maybe they're getting frustrated. And so we're really just focusing on playing between the whistles, and that's where we've been having success. And we're not going to change that. And now is not the time to be settling scores. Because only one team's going to move on from here. And, yes, you want to stick up for all your teammates and all that, but what we've just seen throughout the Playoffs, that's not the way to do bartering and that's not the example. Q. Is there any way to predict what will happen in Game 5? BRYCE SALVADOR: I think game 5 is going to be a pretty energetic, intense game. I think you're going to see similar game to the last four games. The third period, I think it just happened because of score and just the situation and everything.  Like I said, I think I know we're not going to be‑‑ we're going to do what we can to stay out of the penalty box. So how the Rangers are going to play, we don't know. We really just focus on our game and how we need to play. And so I think that's really an important thing. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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