May 2 quotes: Sutter, Kopitar, Fraser, Doughty

Darryl Sutter, on the faceoff challenges in Game 1:
“Other than Richie, it was the lowest-percentage total we had all year for a game. When you have – really, counting Jeff, you have four veteran centermen in your lineup, so they have to make that adjustment. Jarret was getting kicked out. It’s an adjustment, obviously. With them, also, McDonald took a lot of faceoffs on that line, so usually there’s two centermen on the ice for both teams. You’ve got to do a better job. It’s not always the centermen, either. I think that the old theory [is] one guy’s playing to win, four guys are playing to lose it. They need some help, too. There’s a lot of short faceoffs that are won four to five feet, that it becomes a win or loss based on possession, but did the centerman actually win the faceoff, or is it just somebody else getting there for it?”

Sutter, on line adjustments:
“We move our left wings around a lot and continue to do it. I didn’t like the way, quite honest, our left wingers matched up the other night. I’ve coached against Ken a long time. I pretty much know how he likes to use matchups and how we do, so we know that Bouwmeester – hey, 19 (Bouwmeester), 27 (Pietrangelo) are going to be out there a lot when 11’s (Kopitar) on the ice. That’s a fact. And if 42’s (Backes) out there, then so be it. But it trickles out from there. Our left wingers have to do a better job against players on their team.”

Anze Kopitar, on whether the playoffs are any different having won a Stanley Cup:
“No. I think you know what you’re getting. So it shouldn’t be any different. It’s a hard time to play hockey, but it’s also the most fun time to play hockey, so you want you be in this kind of position.”

Kopitar, on what will indicate to him early on that the team is rebounding with a strong effort:
“I mean, nothing out of the ordinary. I mean, we just have to get back to our own system and our own game, and we didn’t do that in game. We have to do it in Game 2. There’s no secret to it, so I don’t think it’s going to be anything special happening out there. But we have to get back to the way we’ve been playing.”

Kopitar, on playing against David Backes:
“Well, he’s a hard guy to play against. He’s pretty physical. He’s a big body. He uses his size well. At the same time, you’ve got to beat that. That’s just the way it goes. I’ve done it before. I know I can do it. I’m going to have to do it again if we want to have some success, for sure.”

Colin Fraser, on dealing with adversity, compared to last year:
“Maybe last game we weren’t quite ready. Last year maybe we could in a sense taken teams by surprise in a way, but we’re not doing that any more. The target’s on our back, and every team’s going to be ready, and especially them. They have all the reason to be ready and play their best game, if you date it back to the playoffs last year. We need to be ready. I think we started playing a lot better as the game went on, but it was kind of too little, too late. Tonight we need to get off to a good start and be ready to play.”

Fraser, on whether last year’s experience provides the Kings the knowledge of what it takes to win in the playoffs:
“For sure. Talk about adversity – maybe losing the first game is a little adversity. But we’ve got to rebound. Every guy we have relatively the same team as we did last season with the exception of a couple guys. So we definitely know what it takes to win, but at the same time we’ve got to do it. So we can sit here and say we know what it takes, but we have to prove it and physically do it.”

Fraser, on whether his skill set fits the style of play in a Los Angeles-St. Louis playoff series:
“I think it’s no secret what our line does or certainly is going to try to do. Just try to provide energy, be physical, play in the O-zone as best we can – much like their line did last game. It’s not going to be easy, but I’m excited. I haven’t played for a while. I’ve kind of been in and out. So it should feel good. Lots of fresh legs, and lots of energy.”

Fraser, on whether the Kings are “different” after having won the Cup, aside from personnel changes:
“No, I don’t think so. I don’t think you’re a different team. I think St. Louis is very comparable to us in the sense of the way they play, the style they play – good forecheck, big, physical, strong kind of style…I think that’s the wawy we’ve played in last year’s playoffs, and even this year, that’s the way we’ve played. They were just better at it in Game 1 that we were. We don’t talk about changing what we’re going to do. We just talk about being better at what we’re going to do.”

Drew Doughty, on whether he had ever played as many as 41-minutes in junior hockey, considering Ryan Suter’s 41-minutes in Game 1 of the Minnesota-Chicago series:
“In junior I played a lot. I played pretty much almost 35 minutes, I think, in just a regular game. And if we ever went to OT, I’m sure I got up to 41. For sure…that happened. There’s definitely some shifts where we’ve had a tough time out there in the D-zone or whatnot, and then you get back out there and you’re a little gassed. But for the most part, we train so hard to be able to go a hundred percent, come off, get a little break and then get right back out there. I love being out there as much as I possibly can.”

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