January 17 morning skate quotes: Darryl Sutter

On how preparation is managed with the later start time due to the ceremony:
Yeah, it’s different. I mean, the ceremony is obviously before warm-up. Generally, around the league, you see them flipped, where it’s the other way around. So it’s different. It’s good that the guys get to watch it, and then they have, I think they have like a six or seven-minute gap in there to [do] whatever they’re doing. Put skates on or whatever it is. And then both teams will get their warm-up.

On last night’s Rob Blake roast:
It was good. [Reporter: I saw some pictures. It looked like fun.] I think that Nellie (Nelson Emerson), Muzz (Glen Murray), Kelly Hrudey, Garry Galley, all did great jobs. And so did Rob, actually. They all did great. It was really good. You know – and they’re not old players, those guys – you can tell. They talked a lot about how much fun they had, that they would’ve liked to have done better if they didn’t have so much fun. It was really well done. The players, all those guys were really good. I was laughing myself, because it’s so normal when old teammates haven’t seen each other, that really enjoyed each other, and they haven’t seen each other for a while. It doesn’t matter who else is there. Eventually, you could see they just – [Reporter: Come together?] Yeah, and then they tell stories. [Reporter: It’s like they just picked up from where they left off, right?] Yeah, it’s pretty neat. You could tell how close they were. Well, you see it with Muzz and Rob and Nellie, anyways. They’re around so much, you could tell they’re like brothers.

On players handling their NHL debut, as it relates to Nick Shore:
Yeah. I mean, I don’t know how to answer it any other way other than you don’t want them to be nervous, you want them to be not nervous where they’re watching, you want them to be energy nervous. [Reporter: Do you know pretty early on when you look at him, if he’s really in the moment?] Well, the challenge tonight, for sure, well, you’re playing a big, physical team that’s really good down the middle of the ice, so there in itself is the challenge. [Reporter: He seems like a pretty mature young man, just from talking to him even just for a few minutes.] I think he’s really settled, and I don’t think he’s going to get too flustered or any of those things. Hey, we need him to perform. We’re in a situation, even though we shut Toronto out two games ago, if you look at it over the last little bit, we’ve given up too many goals against and even though we’re scoring three goals a game, it’s very isolated in terms of who we’re getting it from. And that’s right through our lineup. We have to be able to get some more all-around performances, which includes scoring opportunities, out of more players, and if he can bring that, then obviously it’s going to make a difference to our club.