On what he noticed about any change in his players after winning the Stanley Cup:
I don’t know if it changed after we won the Cup. You get to know them through the playoffs. You get to know the guys who thrive on situations or want the challenge of that. It’s a tough hill to climb, and every game becomes tougher as playoffs go along. That’s what happens, and it sort of sorts out your leadership group, sorts out where your young players are at. We continue to do that. That’s what gets sort of out of place a little bit. We put a lot of young guys in. Everybody says ‘The team won the Cup three years ago, they did it,’ but you’re putting in a lot of guys in, we’re playing them differently where you see whether they can handle it or they can’t handle it. That’s why you see ups and downs in their game.
On whether Game 6 was a representation of all players going pretty well:
No, I don’t think we did. [Reporter: What areas did you think could be cleaned up?] I’m not going to critique or break all that down because that’s not what I like to do. That’s what you like to do. That’s not part of what I do is break down players publicly.
On the benefit for local hockey to have Los Angeles and Anaheim reach a Game 7:
I think the two rivals, especially the one team that had 116 points, probably, would prefer not to play a Game 7. But the other team was prepared to play a Game 7 because we knew that they’re a tough team to beat, and if we could get to seven, that meant that we’d done good things.
On whether he liked Game 7s when he was a player:
I can’t remember. I’m serious. I scored a lot of playoff goals and scored overtime goals, but still, you’ve heard me say this. With coaching, you coach for playoffs. Anybody who doesn’t coach for the playoffs is just coaching for a job. That’s the only reason I still coach is for the playoffs. That’s why there are seven-game series. Most series go six games. So seven becomes a defining moment, but the elimination part of it is every game. That’s how I view it. When you start a series, you’re facing elimination.
On whether the Kings “taking what they need from the last game and forgetting what they don’t” is unique to this particular team:
Yeah. I mean, otherwise teams lose a lot. I’m not used to that.
On whether he’s happy with Trevor Lewis’ production:
You know what? I have a lot of trust in Trevor. It doesn’t matter if he’s scoring or not. We can move him all over the lineup. He’s played left wing the last two games, he’s played center the game before that. He played right wing every game before that. It’s not just about scoring. Obviously in the playoffs it becomes tougher to score goals. As the playoffs go along, it shows up more and more. If you look at the teams, the 16 teams that are in the playoffs, it started, and then if you didn’t the goals against today, they’re probably just about dead on in order, one-through-16, the teams that are still playing, and teams that aren’t and what their series went. So Lewie does a lot more than just score goals. Are we happy that he’s scoring goals? Absolutely. He scored the game-winner last night. He’s comfortable with his role and what he brings, and we’re usually quite happy with that.
On whether he looks ahead to Chicago because of the potential quick turnaround:
No, not at all. Somebody’s going to get to play Chicago. The team who wins tomorrow is going to get to play Chicago, and quite honest, the only time I ever think about Chicago is Chicago’s the defending Stanley Cup team. So the road goes through Chicago.
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