On the ice conditions at practice:
Ice was good today. Back to normal.
On whether he likes the way the Kings’ game is trending:
We still want to cut our goals against down and get our goals for up. So much of the game now is based on the percentages, so you break it down by team and individuals and go from there.
On whether the Kings have been generating more scoring chances:
Yeah. I think the San Jose and the Vancouver game were not very productive in terms of that for us. I thought the other three really were.
On whether he reads into the higher than usual percentage of shots missing the net:
Well, that’s not a bad thing, is it? [Reporter: No. Getting shots. No, absolutely not.] That’ll be my answer. [Reporter: Part of any wider picture of more volume? Is it indicative of anything?] I think volume has been as good as there is in the league. It’s what you want. More is better. It’s not a new theme. It has to be consistent through your lineup. Obviously teams play different in terms of how they defend in their own zone. Sometimes your defensemen have to adjust, sometimes your slot forward has to adjust, things like that. But for the most part, if you’re only basing it on that, then we have guys that have 20 goals and are minus-20. We went through that last year.
On the amount of penalties:
Yep, too many, clearly. Even in the games we’ve lost it’s taken momentum from our game. Regardless of what the score is, if you go back to the San Jose game – hey, I don’t have much patience for offensive zone penalties and not moving your feet penalties or letting your get in the way, things like that. I don’t have much use for those penalties. The fact is is we took a huge stride in that last year in terms of taking that out of our game and getting into the whatever it is, the top-10 or top-five in terms of the fewest taken. You have to be in that three-range. You know what it’s like, because you start pushing those minutes up and you’re into the six-to-nine minutes of killing, and a lot of the same guys that kill penalties for us are also our power play guys, so who knows how that’s impacted the power play, too. We spend a lot killing penalties.
On whether he’d like to get another look at Jordan Weal:
Yeah, I would. Andy’s outplayed him again the last two or three games. There’s a big difference. We play big teams. For sure what I’ve seen, if you looked at San Jose the first game, how big down the middle they are. It’s a big team down the middle of the ice. Will we get a look at him? It’s a long year. We’ve played five games. If we had 14 forwards, you know what? You’d be saying that about two other guys, not one guy. We’ve already used how many forwards and how many forwards in five games? … If we were 5-0, we probably wouldn’t have made one change from what we started with. I’m not really into the other part of it.
On how close Matt Greene is to returning in a full capacity:
Greener? He’s got to be pain free, so unless he says he’s pain free, then he’s close. [Reporter: Is this related to the thing he had earlier, near the end of training camp?] Yeah, it’s the same area. … He’s doing a lot to get game ready, so whenever that is, now we’re going to get to where we’re not here much. You can’t be having a guy who’s on your roster that’s questionable. We’re thankful we’re only going to San Jose and then back, and then Ontario’s here in town, so it’s pretty easy to get a guy. It’s easier to answer that before we go on the Edmonton-Winnipeg swing. Easier. Then we’ll know if he’s ready or not.
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