NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: MIGHTY DUCKS v DEVILS

June 1, 2003

Pat Burns

COACH BURNS: In the playoffs, he's been probably one of our best players forwardwise. On the offense, he's been producing. He's skating. He's trying to beat guys one-on-one to the outside. He's a tremendously gifted athlete. He's hard to stop when he puts all those things into perspective.

COACH BURNS: I don't think there will be any.

COACH BURNS: I don't think so. I think the only thing that Marty proved last night is he's human, like everybody else is. There was a lot of laughing about it this morning, talking about it, and guys want to know if they could run a drill that way and things like that. That's part of it. You put it aside and you forget about it. And we're all anxious to see how he'll react tomorrow. If you ask me, we know he'll react strongly.

COACH BURNS: They have a particularly extremely talented faceoff team. Steve Rucchin is one of the very good faceoff men; Adam Oates is probably the all-time best. They do get a lot of our guys kicked out because they cheat. If you're smart enough to get away with it, I think that's probably a quality. The other part, that's up to the linesman's job. If you ask me if they do encroach and cheat a bit, yes, they do. I don't see everything that goes on in that faceoff dot from the bench, but if he says it, it's probably right.

COACH BURNS: You and I can't see it. Their stick won't be on the ice at the proper time. They have their skates turned a little bit. They'll fake a little bit to get our guy to move. They do it well. Why say it's something wrong they're doing, because they're allowed to do it. You can do anything you want in life, just don't get caught. They're doing it.

COACH BURNS: There could be -- I don't think there will be, but he hasn't played for a long, long time. He hasn't practiced for us. I don't want to put Rupp into a position right now, because there is no panic. It's not a time to panic. There is no situation why we should. We lost a game. We have to come back and play a strong game tomorrow. The two guys back home, if you find out something, let me know. I haven't heard anything.

COACH BURNS: No.

COACH BURNS: Yeah, he was fine today. He was out there skating today. There is so many boards you can run through before it starts getting to you a little bit. That's the way he plays. Sometimes it's good to give him that opportunity, and Marty didn't need the work today, I don't think.

COACH BURNS: He is. Other goaltenders have these superstitions and they're usually different cats. Marty is like talking to a forward. Probably the two guys -- I guess his character you will almost compare to Grant Fuhr a little bit. He was like, "Oh, well, I got 60 shots. Oh, well, it wasn't bad." That's the way it was. Marty is a bit like that, too, where he brushes off a lot of things like that and doesn't worry too much about things. He knows how to focus in a certain way, and we don't know how it is, but he certainly finds a way to do it.

COACH BURNS: We possibly have the best teacher in faceoffs in Bob Carpenter. It's a skill, and it's a talent. Can anybody teach anybody to play like Wayne Gretzky? I don't think so, because that was a skill and God-given talent. Adam Oates has always been known as one of the top faceoff guys in the league, and Steve Rucchin is not very far behind. And they have this kid, Krog, that does all the faceoffs in their defensive zones. I don't think Scottie Gomez was a center all his life. Since he's been with us with the Devils, he played a lot on wing a lot of times. Bobby Holik is probably one of the very good faceoffs guys too. Those are things prior to the game, but he's a young player. He's only 23 years old and Gomez will learn how to take those big draws. Pascal came over from a team, he tried to win it and he lost it. That's part of it. That's part of the game. I think Joe basically is one of our probably best faceoff men. But when you come off from a shift, you can't keep on going back with him all the time. I said last night, Joe Nieuwendyk is a very good faceoff. He's not here.

COACH BURNS: I think there is an old rule that has a lot of things I learned in the years. One thing Harry Sinden told me in Boston, and it made sense: "When you get into a faceoff situation, you don't have to win it, but you can't lose it." That always made sense to me. Sometimes you have to tie the guy up. Sometimes you have to have people come in helping you out. That deal there, I think guys have to really talk to each other and then help each other out. I think tying the guys up or whatnot could be one of the factors. I answered for Joe. Joe is one of the very good faceoff guys in the NHL. That's not an excuse. We have to find a way to be better.

COACH BURNS: I think that we didn't get a fourth line center until the trade deadline. We had guys like Gomez taking a lot of draws. Our faceoff has been a concern most of the year, but I think we got away with it. Of course, we did; we wouldn't be here. I don't think by losing faceoffs we're sitting here today. I don't think that was one of the major problems. We found a way. Of course, we wouldn't be sitting here. We have to find a way to battle through this too.

COACH BURNS: Refresh my memory of '93 and '95.

COACH BURNS: Yeah. Well, I think, again, I was just battling and doing the proper things in '93. We beat the Red Wings, who finished first overall. We had to come back. We got slaughtered in the first two games. We ended up winning by overtime in the seventh game. '95 in Chicago, the same thing. Those things are in the past, and I appreciate the fact we're bringing up some good things, but we have to worry about 2003 right now, and we're not behind. I don't think we have to worry about a comeback right now. I think there is a one-game situation where we lost last night. I don't consider it the end of the world. This team, Anaheim, deserves all the respect in the world, because they are sitting here with us, like we deserve respect. What Giguere said on ESPN, there was a lot of things that he said that was right. This team deserves, and we deserve the right to be here now. We have to respect them, and we do respect them in all ends of it. Last night one got away from us. We have to stand together as a team and come back and fight for it.

COACH BURNS: It seems to me that they think because the team loses, they didn't show up. We showed up last night, and again it came down to an overtime situation. We were maybe a little bit better, but in Games 1 and 2 we had the breaks, we had opportunities. I don't think the line matching made much of a difference last night. It wasn't the big players that beat us. I don't think that was a real effect. The bounces came from -- and whether it be Marty's first goal or second goal, it all comes down to that. We had some bounces back home and things went our way. That's why it's called a game. That's why this is fun.

COACH BURNS: It would be nice, but the importance of it? Every team would love it, but I don't think we have that real kind of offense because Niedermayer and Rafalski and Tverdovsky will get the odd point in the powerplay. I don't think we're a dominating team when it comes to getting offense from the defense.