On Jarret Stoll skating and returning to practice:
He skated the whole time we were gone. He actually started the second day of the trip, so he’s been totally cleared. He probably could’ve joined us in Chicago. [Reporter: Is it safe than sorry at this point, just give him a little extra time to get in there, or could he play tomorrow?] Well, time is of the essence, obviously, but at the same time, it’s a head injury so you still have to work past all the protocol and all that, so we’ll just kind of go day-to-day again. [Reporter: He sounded like he wanted to play tomorrow.] Yeah, and that’s a good thing. You like guys who want to play. [Reporter: Could you make the decision on him tomorrow?] Yeah, absolutely. I mean, he skated once with the team now since he got hurt in Vancouver. Once.
On this being a “fun time of the year” with a clear objective:
It’s what we talked about after the All-Star break. We broke it down into trips and games and home stands and divisions, and we’ve hit everything. If you only took it off the last trip, we got six out of 10. That’s how you look at it. So now we go into – what have we got left – six, three-and-three home-and-road, and five are division. So that’s what it comes down to. [Reporter: It’s a situation, too, though, I mean, you don’t have to do a lot of scoreboard watching if you take care of your business.] Yeah, that’s exactly right. Everybody asks you that. ‘Are you scoreboard watching?’ Well, of course you are because you’re a fan and it does matter, but still, you can do your own math. It’s just what I just said. We’ve still got to take care of business at home. We’re going to be close to be having – even already – one of the best home-ice records in the franchise’s history. In fact, we’re probably ahead of any year that I’ve been here, and there were years where they’ve had half this many. Take care of business at home first. We start tomorrow.
On how he’ll follow tonight’s Edmonton-Anaheim game in preparation for tomorrow:
Well, they’ve had some change in personnel since just before the All-Star break and the trade deadline, so you have to get a better read on that, and obviously with a coaching change, we’ve played ‘em once with a coaching change, so you see the difference in their playing. Obviously the last time we played them, I’m just thinking off the top of my head, they didn’t have Hall in the lineup and they do now, so that would be a significant player upgrade.
On whether teams outside of the playoff picture play “free and easy”:
I couldn’t tell you. I don’t have experience with that. [Reporter: So it sounds like no.] I couldn’t tell you. You’d have to ask them. I mean, you’d have to ask the coaches and players on teams that are used to not making playoffs how they feel in April. [Reporter: No, I mean, how do you feel about playing teams that are allegedly playing with nothing to lose, just going out and playing.] They’re not playing for nothing to lose, are they? If I have a chance to make somewhere between 700 and seven million dollars, and it’s based on how I play in April, I’m not playing for nothing to lose.
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