High-anxiety time?

Terry Murray held two hours’ worth of meetings yesterday. He completely shuffled his forward lines. He changed goalies. The message in inescapable: Murray feels the Kings need to bring a sense of urgency to tonight’s game. But there can be a fine line, in sports, between “urgency” and “panic,” and one of the worst things a coach can do is create a sense of panic. This morning, in discussing the game, Murray certainly didn’t sound panicked, and his even-keel approach is, in general, the antithesis of panic, but what do the players think?

I asked Sean O’Donnell, the Kings’ most veteran player, about yesterday’s meetings and how much urgency he thinks needs to be brought after two consecutive losses…

O’DONNELL: “It’s tough, because you look at these seven home games at a time when we really want to put a stamp on our season and, hopefully, distance ourselves and solidify our position. We had a great game against Detroit, just a couple mistakes, and then we didn’t have a solid game. The St. Louis game was probably our first game in a while where we just didn’t come out sharp and were flat. You don’t want to make too big a deal of it, because really that’s just one game.

“The Detroit game, we did everything right. We just make a couple mistakes, and then there was the St. Louis game. It’s the kind of thing where, we have to win tonight, so it’s just considered one game. If we don’t get a win tonight, then it starts to snowball. You want to stop that as quick as you can. Everyone is talking about the seven-game homestand being big, seven-game homestand this and that, about how it will make our season, but I’m a big believer in just going one game at a time. As boring as that sounds, our job tonight is to play San Jose and try to get two points.”

Question: So, you guys are tired of losing, and the Sharks are tired of losing to you…

O’DONNELL: “Well, I’m sure they’re going to have a little snarl. We beat them pretty good there the other day, and any time they play Detroit, that’s a pretty good rivalry, and Detroit beat them 4-1. I’m sure they have something to prove, coming in. It’s not going to be an easy game, but it seems like every game is that way.”