Coaching changes in Los Angeles are certainly nothing new for Dustin Brown. Brown was a second-year pro when Andy Murray got fired near the end of the 2005-06 season, and an established player when Marc Crawford got fired two years later. Now, it’s Terry Murray, as Brown prepares to play for his fifth coach in his eighth NHL season (with likely a sixth coach on the way). After practice today, Brown talked about the coaching change and the necessary direction of the team…
BROWN: “I’ve been through this before. It’s not an easy thing to go through. It’s really hard to kind of put into words how you feel, as a group of guys in here, when something like this happens. I think the best thing we can do, as players, is come together and work through it. It’s part of being a professional athlete, going through days like this. It’s up to the players in here to come together and step up and play. We’ve got two points that we need tonight. It’s definitely not a normal situation, but that should be our focus going in. We’ve got two points, and we need them.’’
Question: Were you surprised by the move?
BROWN: “To some extent, yeah. We know we’ve been struggling. We know the situation at hand. I think guys were probably a little surprised with the timing, I guess, but management felt they needed to make the decision they did. The players, we knew we needed to be better and that something was going to change if we didn’t get better. It happened pretty quick.’’
Question: Do you think drastic changes are needed here?
BROWN: “Regardless of how we play the game, I think it’s more about our attitude, honestly. The difference, the parity, especially in the West, the teams are so close. It’s more about the type of attitude we bring to the game. We have to have a better, more hungry attitude. We weren’t a hungry team. We’ve got to get back to getting on the puck and having that attitude, that swagger. You look at the top teams in the league, they all have an attitude. Minnesota is probably a good example of that. I don’t think, if you looked on paper, they are the best team in the league, but right now they’re playing with attitude. We, as a team, as a group of players, have to find that team attitude.’’
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