September 21 postgame quotes: Stevens, Quick, Kempe

John Stevens, on scoring four special teams goals and finding success on the penalty kill:
There were too many. It’s a little bit of a frustrating thing for everyone, but I think we can do a little better job on our own part. We know what they’re looking for. We know what [inaudible] for preseason, and I think we have to do a better job with our sticks. The majority of the penalties in the first two games we’ve played have been stick penalties, but having said that, I thought we did some really good things five-on-five offensively. I thought our penalty kill battled extremely hard for the amount of minutes they had to kill and we had some key saves in key times, and I thought our power play early was very effective and moved the puck well in time in the zone. Certainly there were a lot of positives from the game, but there are an awful lot of things that we’re going to have to improve on as well.

Stevens, on what he liked about the team’s five-on-five play:
It just seemed like there was less hesitation in our thinking. We had some really good rush attacks with a middle lane drive, we had good rush attacks with our D involved in the rush, and I thought we did a much better job of using the back of the net and changing the point of attack offensively, and our guy that was trying to get open in the slot was much more patient than he had been and let the guys down low go to work. There were a lot of things that we liked, but again, I wish we had more time, five-on-five, and then certainly the commitment to play without the puck was there tonight, which we’re going to continue to demand.

Stevens on whether there was historical significance, or whether it was another preseason game:
No, I think there’s definitely some significance to playing the game here. Guys were talking about it, to be the first team to come over here and one of the first teams to play a game here. It was exciting for our group, and quite honest, we didn’t know what to expect. We didn’t know the crowd, the noise, the atmosphere, but I think the whole thing for me is that we’re here to grow the game, and it’s my hope that the more they see it, the more people like it, and I think the more its exposed to people over here, I think the fan base is going to grow.

Stevens on what would be a success at the end of the games, and whether it can be measured yet:
I’m not sure you can, but I think if you look around the National Hockey League, what’s happened is really a grassroots program to grow the game, and if you look what’s happened in California – I’m sure Gretzky’s had a lot to do with that, with the amount of rinks now and the amount of kids playing. So I think if we can stir some interest in the game, if they build some rinks like they were talking about doing and get more kids playing, it’s just a great game. It’s a fun game to watch, but I think the more focus that gets on that grassroots program, I think it’s going to really lead to a much, much bigger fan base over time.

Jonathan Quick, on whether the penalty kills allowed him to find a rhythm:
I don’t mind the work, it’s just kind of kills the game a little bit. There’s no flow, no rhythm to the game. It’s a lot of whistles. You get third and fourth line guys that don’t play for five, six, seven, eight minutes, so it’s tough when you have to get into the game and as a team just roll four lines and get everything going.

Quick, on the crowd response, and whether it felt like the team was putting on a show:
I mean, I didn’t feel like that. Obviously for maybe a lot of ‘em it was their first experience seeing a game live, but at the same time, I just felt like it’s training camp and get used to playing a full hockey game again and compete in certain different areas.

Adrian Kempe, on the crowd response, and whether it felt like they were putting on a show:
I agree with Johnny. We’re all trying to make the team, especially me, so I’m just going to play my game, every game. It doesn’t matter where we play and everything. It was a good experience.

Kempe, on opening up the China Games with the first goal:

I was happy I was the first guy who scored, obviously. We had a good start and it was a nice shot, so I was glad.

-Lead photo via Yifan Ding/Getty Images

Rules for Blog Commenting

  • No profanity, slurs or other offensive language. Replacing letters with symbols does not turn expletives into non-expletives.
  • Personal attacks against other blog commenters, and/or blatant attempts to antagonize other comments, are not tolerated. Respectful disagreement is encouraged. Posts that continually express the same singular opinion will be deleted.
  • Comments that incite political, religious or similar debates will be deleted.
  • Please do not discuss, or post links to websites that illegally stream NHL games.
  • Posting under multiple user names is not allowed. Do not type in all caps. All violations are subject to comment deletion and/or banning of commenters, per the discretion of the blog administrator.

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.