Brown, Stoll postgame quotes (May 13)

Dustin Brown’s and Jarret Stoll’s postgame thoughts…

(on Slava Voynov’s pass on Brown’s goal…)
BROWN: “Yeah, I mean, he’s a pretty skilled guy. Not many people know about him. He has the ability to make those long stretch passes, which are not easy. We did a lot of those short plays breaking out. I kind of caught one of their D sleeping a little bit. (Voynov) put it right on my tape.”

(on rebounding from Derek Morris’ red-line goal…)
STOLL: “That was probably the biggest game we’ve had so far in the playoffs with that much adversity against us. A tough goal. Then a little miscommunication behind our net with our goalie and our defense. Tough goal to give up. On the bench, we were fine. On the ice, we were fine. We kept pushing and pushing. We knew we were playing our game for the most part there, great shifts. Just kept staying positive. We all know, on our team, that wasn’t going to beat us. That’s just the way we played.”

(on the growth of Dwight King…)
STOLL: “Yeah, he’s a strong guy. He’s very smart, too. He thinks the game well. With me, him and (Trevor) Lewis, we’re on the same page defensively, trying to turn over pucks. He protects the puck so well. He can find the puck and score well. He did it in junior. A lot of people have done it in junior. You come up here, he’s contributed down the stretch in the playoffs. It’s not easy for a young guy coming in to be put in a role like that, be playing an empty-netter in the Western Conference Finals and he’s on the ice. So he’s a big part of our team.”

(on whether Jonathan Quick said anything to the team during the first intermission…)
BROWN: “No, he didn’t say much. Quicker, he doesn’t really talk a lot. He makes 25 big saves a game and he don’t say anything after those. He lets one in that he probably wants back, he just put his head
down and got back to work. There were one or two saves that were pretty remarkable in the third (period). One on the blocker’s side (with), I don’t know, four or five minutes left in the third. That definitely saved the game for us. He’s one of those guys, he gets right back at it and doesn’t let it
affect him.”

(on expecting a push-back against his line in Game 2…)
BROWN: “It’s just like pretty much any series. You get that first game out of the way, start looking at film, tendencies. I’m not sure what they’re going to try to do to (try to) stop us. It’s one of those things where they’re going to make adjustments. It’s up to us, as players, to make adjustments in games to be effective and have an impact on Game 2.”

(on how much momentum the Kings generate from successful penalty kills…)
STOLL: “Quite a bit. Smart pressure. You can pressure all you want, (but) if you’re not smart with it and you got one guy going and you got two guys sitting back, gaps open up, lanes open up (and) a good power play can pick you apart. We’re all on the same page, moving together, pressuring together. If you get one extra guy in there (on a power play), they’re going to get a shot, a chance. As
long as it’s not a grade-A scoring chance, Quickie is going to save those all right.”

(on Brown’s game…)
STOLL: “He’s an all-right player, yeah. [laughter] He’s doing it all for us. Both ends of the rink, too. Not just offensively, which is nice, but coming back defensively, being physical, leading by example. He doesn’t say all the rah-rah stuff sometimes, but he definitely speaks on the ice.”

(on whether the Kings were frustrated, being tied after two periods…)
BROWN: “No. We knew coming in, you watch Phoenix play, they got a really good goaltender. Part of our thing is getting as many shots on him as we can, make him work, make it hard for him. The more saves he has, the chances for us winning go up. On the flip side, we understand they’re a very opportunistic team. They’ve won games in this playoffs getting 10 shots, 12 shots. They are very patient, very opportunistic. They get a chance off the forecheck, it’s 2-2, (but) that didn’t change our mindset. I think we’re pretty well aware of how opportunistic they are.”

(on whether it was nerve-wracking to be a tight game like that…)
BROWN: “(It’s) one of those things where, at this time of year, you’ve got to just stick with the game plan, execute. Things will fall into place if you work hard. It’s one of those things where, we’ve got to keep going with the type of offensive threats we had tonight. We had a lot of shots, a lot of traffic. They’re going to get chances. That’s part of the game. That’s why we have a goalie, as well. We’ve just got to keep on making it hard on Smith. The longer they play in their D zone, the more tired they’re going to get. Over the course of the series, that’s going to be to our advantage.”