March 21 morning skate quotes: Dustin Penner

On whether he watched last night’s Anaheim – Chicago game:
“I watched yesterday, just because I went through all my Family Guy and Modern Family episodes, so the hockey was the next choice.”

On whether it’s good to have a hockey-free recovery day:
“It is nice. You get to do a lot of things you’re not able to do on other days. Sleep in. Not have to worry about not being on time for something. You get to do errands like dry cleaning. I went to see my osteopath, who’s really a type of an ART (Active Release Techniques) specialist. Things like that that get you back on track.”

On whether he has a body rhythm that wakes him up early:
“I dont know. Some guys do, but the way we play and travel, I just listen to my body, what it tells me. Yesterday it said ‘sleep in.’”

On the league weighing the possibility of grandfathering in a mandatory visor rule:
“I don’t agree on mandatory visors.”

On his preference of playing without a visor:
“I don’t want to…there’s a lot of maintenance with it. Always wiping it. You get snow on it. It melts, turns into water. It cracks, scratches. [I’ve heard] “What about your eye?’ Well, what if I get hit by a bus? It’s just a rule put in place. It’s big government.”

On mandatory visors and potential rule changes:
“If they go mandatory visors, they have to take out the instigator rule. You can’t have the cake and eat it too. It’s like with Muzzin – that four minute, it’s great that he stepped in, but then they scored two, right? He’s doing what he’s supposed to do, and he gets penalized for it.”

On the loss to Dallas two weeks ago:
“I recall that game. It’s one of those games that…I think we could have won, but for whatever reason, they got the bounces, and when other teams are getting the bounces and you feel you’re working hard, you have to work even harder to tilt things back in your favor. Some games you don’t have to work as hard. Like, Phoenix played great the other night, and we were opportunistic. Stoli scored a huge goal. We held on. We don’t want to be in that position too many times. But some games you have to hold on. With the schedule, just kind of bend but don’t break.”

On strong home starts and not having trailed at home since the last Dallas game:
“I don’t think our first periods are where we want them to be. I don’t know if we’re still one of the worst teams for goal totals in the first period, but I imagine…it’s getting better?…So we’ve always throughout the year talked about getting our starts better. You never want to spot the other team one and then work your way back. When you get one, the second one’s easier. It makes their first one harder. It’s just that ebb and flow or natural process of a game. You feed off momentum.”

On whether visiting teams play more desperate when trailing the defending champions:
“I don’t think that plays into the desperation, the fact that we won the Cup…Look how close the race is for playoffs. There’s 19 games left. Some have 18 games left. There’s going to be desperation as soon as you get down because these two points mean so much, and especially in a division game, they mean four. I don’t think us winning the Stanley Cup has a lot to do with the desperation in the other team’s game.”

Rules for Blog Commenting

  • No profanity, slurs or other offensive language. Replacing letters with symbols does not turn expletives into non-expletives.
  • Personal attacks against other blog commenters, and/or blatant attempts to antagonize other comments, are not tolerated. Respectful disagreement is encouraged. Posts that continually express the same singular opinion will be deleted.
  • Comments that incite political, religious or similar debates will be deleted.
  • Please do not discuss, or post links to websites that illegally stream NHL games.
  • Posting under multiple user names is not allowed. Do not type in all caps. All violations are subject to comment deletion and/or banning of commenters, per the discretion of the blog administrator.

Repeated violations of the blog rules will result in site bans, commensurate with the nature and number of offenses.

Please flag any comments that violate the site rules for moderation. For immediate problems regarding problematic posts, please email zdooley@lakings.com.