Here are Terry Murray’s further thoughts about Jonathan Quick, including the disclosure that he planned to have a meeting with Quick today. Shortly, I’ll post Quick’s thoughts, both about his play and his new contract…
Question: Do you personally address the goalies a lot, or do you leave most of that to Bill (Ranford)?
MURRAY: “A lot of that is left to Bill. He spends a lot of time with them on the ice, off the ice, reviewing their game. I’m going to have a meeting here with Quick now, now that practice is over. I think it’s important to have a little bit of a conversation. To me, when I watch the game unfold last night, I’m seeing a little bit of a lack of concentration only. I’m not going to get into the technical stuff. I’ll leave that to the goaltending coach.
“But from the mental side of the game, the focus needs to be there. There is a responsibility with being the No. 1 goaltender. He clearly has to understand that. That sometimes has an effect on goaltenders, whenever they are given that label. It’s a very big responsibility, but I want to just reassure him that we’re looking for him to be just a goaltender. Go out and play the game the right way, keep your focus and give us an opportunity to win any game.”
I like the things he has said regarding Quick. He obviously has a lot of confidence in him which is important for a young goaltender. He is blunt when he doesn’t play well, but he comes back and basically says it is because he knows he can be so much better, which he proved during last season.
Considering it does seem to be more of a concentration issue I am guessing we will see his play continue to get better.
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As far as the team goes, 10 games in, Quick has clearly been the biggest disappointment, yet we’re 6-4. I know it’s early still, but if Quick picks up his game, I feel like we have a very realistic chance at making the playoffs. Not a pipe dream, not a hope, but a solid chance.
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You can see that expectations are much higher this year than last. I hope this added pressure doesn’t start to affect play. I.E. the Frolov one bad game and you’re benched.
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If we play at this level the rest of the year, 12 points every 10 games, does that not put us at about 96 to 100 points give or take?
Anaheim was 8th with 91. So even if we play the way we have been without improving, it seems to me we have a pretty good shot.
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What the hell do you people expect? We’re talking about Jonathan Quick, not the second coming of Georges Vezina. Look at Carey Price, look at Lehtonen… these guys had far more fanfare. What you see is what you get. You really think Quick was that much better last year? The Kings didn’t make the playoffs. Your saviour goaltender wasn’t all that good even then.
I like Quick. He’s athletic. Remember when we had to hear Terry Murray say that about him 18474 times last year. He’s athletic? I’d love to see ONE Kings goaltender actually headman a puck ONCE in this century. LOL.
It could be worse… did you see Jeff Schultz’ goal last night?
http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/Video-Who-had-more-embarrassing-goal-Pavelec-o?urn=nhl,197825
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i believe our entire season rests on how well quick does. look at last night against dallas, quick had a very poor game and it went to overtime. we outplayed them by a mile and they were still allowed to come back and make a game of it. if quick was on his game they should have only scored 1 maybe 2 goals. we need our goaltenders to be great not average to take the next step.
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Great Goals! And even though I like Quick, these were tougher plays (bouncing pucks) then the goal that Quick gave up from the blue line last night.
It should be clear by now that Frolov was not benched because of one bad game.
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fourtunato, I’m pretty sure you can’t get into the playoffs with Quick’s numbers averaged out over the entire season. In other words, we’re kinda playing on credit right now. If things stay the same, sooner or later we’ll pay with interest (i.e. golfing in june). As for expectations, well, hmmm, let’s see, perhaps just a little, tiny bit of IMPROVEMENT. Too much to ask?
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What we are seeing is that TM is the right coach for this young team. He understands what it will take to bring about a winning attitude here.
I would much rather have this “teaching” approch than having Crawford yelling at the young player or Andy Murray slipping insprational notes under the hotel room door at night.
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My wife doesn’t understand why I came home without my hat last night. Watching the ice girl trying to pursuade the crowd to stop throwing them on the ice was hilarious.
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Ha ha I liked that last one JWR, slipping notes at night…lol, was never a big fan of murrays overanalyzing and over technical teachings, im scared quikers gonna tire out if hes gonna end up with 70+ games, whats needed is the competant backup, already i dont think theres much faith in ersberg
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fortunato: But if everyone except us improves…
For the record, I think we have a very good shot if Quick plays up to his capabilities.
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A nice backup for the Kings would be Dwayne Roloson. DL should acquire him for purcel and ersberg. Roloson would also be a pretty good mentor for Quick as well… Man, only if I were the GM, this team would be a Stanley cup contender by the end of the season…
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I’m glad Murray is holding Quick accountable. He seems to be doing that more with more players this year. I don’t remember him ever calling out Labs. In fact, I remember him defending Labs quite a bit, which used to really get me because it was like, Murray, that’s smoke up our you know where, and it’s obvious.
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Here is my take on the psyche of this team.
TM has to get the Hollywood out of the heads of each player on the team. They got to start playing an honest game of HOCKEY. And so far this year I have not seen it.
Hockey requires a lot of sacrifice. You can not have a winning team without it.
Last night, this team took the third period off. Allowed Dallas to come back and steal a point from them. And one reason that I can see is, they simply stopped playing the game of hockey and began to be to cute with the puck and began to play like CELEBRITIES, which they are not. It’s disappointing to see this and what’s more disappointing is that TM has been unable to get the celebrity mindset out these guys and instill a regular hockey mindset into them.
I think it’s the city. It has a funny way of infecting any athlete who comes here with this virus called “I AM A CELEBRITY NOW”, and don’t have to hustle out there any more the wins and points are just going to be given to me. Give me a break.
Roger
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Hey cmon now isnt jarret stoll a celebrity by dating rachel hunter?….lol
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I dont think it has to do with the celebrity mind set.. thats an excuse. If that was the case, then how did the quakers win their first cup before us?!
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Didn’t Rachel Hunter and he split up?
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Khanon
That was a good one man, thanks for the little bit of levity before the weekend.
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Very interesting to see this blog. I was out all day and the thought that repeatedly came to my mind was that Quick is having problems of concentration. You don’t miss shots like Fistric’s if you’re concentrating. It’s that simple….. so very interesting to see that TM’s take on it is identical to mine (not that I’m an expert.. but it’s pretty fundamental).
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Quick’s numbers are low because of the quality of shots he’s seeing, not the quanitity. If they get back to the form they had in the beginning after the first game, where they kept all the action to the outside where it belongs, and they stop having total meltdowns on special teams, you’ll see the problem simply is not Quick. If anything, he’s having problems concentrating because the people in front of him are playing inconsistent defense and poor special teams.
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