Patient with Purcell

It’s been a rough past month or so for Teddy Purcell. His season started out well enough, as he had two goals in his first three games as the second-line left wing, but since then he has three assists in 18 games and has bounced between being a fourth-line winger and a healthy scratch. Purcell, after one game on the third line, will be back to the fourth tomorrow, and Terry Murray was asked today how much patience he would have with Purcell going forward…

MURRAY: “I’m pretty patient. I keep staying on it though. I’m not going to go away from it. I’ll keep demands on him, as far as doing things the way we’re supposed to do it, with the dot-to-board play, the hard play, the going to the net, shooting the puck. I’m not going to leave it. It will be up to him, maybe, to lose patience with me. He brings a special skill to the game. We have that awareness to it — special teams, power play, especially, he’s very good there — but the numbers aren’t there. We’re just going to stay on it and see where it takes us right now.”