On how having two days before Game 3 affects his usage, and Drew Doughty:
Well, you play 30-plus minutes because you play overtime. Drew, if you’re just talking about the specific player, he plays 26 minutes, so that’s pretty much what he’d probably play tonight if there’s not overtime.
On whether he’s happy with the Kopitar-Getzlaf match-up:
We’ve seen lots of it over the last couple years. We’ve also seen a lot of Koivu against Kopi, and we’re good either way. It’s not so much them head-to-head, quite honest. Everybody knows they’re both top guys both ways in a lot of situations – power play, penalty kill and faceoffs – a lot of that, so they’re going to be on the ice together. So I don’t it’s a match-up necessarily to coach, it’s just how many minutes they play. They both play 20-plus minutes, so they’re going to be on the ice a lot. Obviously Getzlaf and Perry play together lots just about every shift. We had seen Beleskey there in Game 1, but we’ve also seen several different left wingers there, and I think that affects the line more than who we play those guys head-to-head.
On whether this is the best play he has seen from Anze Kopitar:
You mean playoffs, regular season? [Reporter: Playoffs]. I think he’s had three pretty good layoffs in a row. [Reporter: The impact of having Gaborik and Carter alongside him, what it does just for his game, opening up the ice?] He plays with Gaborik a lot.
On what he saw in his penalty killing that was so effective in Game 1:
Hopefully we see less of it. I mean, both teams had seven or eight minutes in power play, and I think you’re still trying to get into the three power plays a game, which is clearly is a benchmark or something that you’re trying ot do. I mean, you start pushing into four, they’re a team that likes playing a lot of four-on-four hockey and can draw you in, Hey, they try and do that, so we’re trying to stay away from it.
On goalies with competitive streaks that remind him of Jonathan Quick:
Yeah, one Hall of Famer, Eddie Belfour, and another one that’s going to be. Miikka Kiprusoff. [Reporter: If you could elaborate on the comparisons with Quick and Belfour and Kipper.] All three win lots of games, all three played lots of playoff games, all three play a lot of games, all three are great competitors, all three are looked on as leaders in the room. All three played a long time. [Reporter: Is his temperament like Eddie’s?] I think they’re similar.
Rules for Blog Commenting
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.