March 5 postgame quotes: Montreal

Max Pacioretty, on whether he is pleased with the team’s effort:
It’s not a good result at all. We had that game in the bag and we were playing the right way and then obviously we let it slip and that’s a frustrating feeling. We’ve got to find ways to close out games, especially against an opponent like that who have had a lot of success as of late. They’re making a push, they’re a desperate team and like I said, we’ve got to find a way to choke teams out and it’s frustrating that we weren’t able to.

Pacioretty, on rallying from a two-goal deficit after the first period:
Every game writes its own story. We thought we came out slow but we recouped pretty well and got some bounces finally and then used that for momentum. I said it before, we’ve got to find a way to close games out. I think we’re 40 seconds away from a two-point win in regulation and you can’t let those things happen.

P.K. Subban on the game:
We made it way too easy on their defense early on in the game and then we made it a lot tougher by getting in on the forecheck and putting pucks at net. I mean, Jonathan Quick is a great goaltender but when you have five shots at the end of the second or mid-way through the second, it’s not enough. But we did a good job battling back into the game and stealing ourselves a point.

Brendan Gallagher, on whether the game had a playoff atmosphere:
Yeah, there was definitely a little more intensity for this one. I think you could feel it on the ice and we were obviously very disappointed with ourselves after the first period. But came out, showed some character, battled back. There were definitely a lot of emotions. They play hard. When you play the best, you want to up your game. I thought we did a good job of that the last 40 minutes. We played more our style of hockey and we were kind of able to control the pace of the play and we were able to chip away and get a lead. Like I said, unfortunately we weren’t able to come away with two points, but for the most part this year, our team has been pretty good at that.

Michel Therrien, on whether he is happy that his team was able to earn a point:
Well, we start playing in the second period. We didn’t play well in the first and we played like a team that played last night and we start competing in the second. I like the way we started playing in the second and third.

Therrien, on whether Tom Gilbert’s goal provided his team a spark:
It gave us some life. I thought we played well in the second. I think we played well starting in the second period. Obviously we didn’t play well in the first, as we all know. After that, we took a penalty. It’s just bad luck with Lars. Lars competed very hard again tonight, he did a lot of good things but it was unfortunate at that time. It’s just bad luck.