June 6 postgame quotes: Mike Stothers

On limiting Utica to 17 shots on goal:
Well, it’s a team thing. We’ve tried to do that all season long. I think it was hard to find any ice out there for both teams. A lot of neutral zone congestion. You know what? We were good at keeping things to the outside tonight. We were good at headmanning the puck and trying not to spend time in our end. We were down to five D, we wanted to keep the puck going the other way and not spend any time in our end.

On Andrew Bodnarchuk’s play when the team was down to five defensemen:
I always like Bods. I’m a Bods fan. But I’m a big fan of our group of defensemen, and I think that he can skate. LoVerde can skate. Miller can skate. Gravel can skate. Forbort can skate. So it’s not that big of a crisis when you go down to five. Those guys can all skate, so they can log a lot of minutes and they’re in good shape. It’s not the ideal situation for that length of time with five, but you’ve got to give your forwards credit, too. We did a good job of recognizing when our defensemen had been out there for a good period of time, and we kept advancing the puck or at least getting it out of our zone so we could get some changes. It’s a heads up play by everybody. It’s a heads up play by Berube to get a faceoff if we needed it.

On what he learned about Utica:
I learned they were a good team, but I knew that going in. I thought it was a great hockey game. Game 1 … I thought it was a terrific hockey game. It was decided in overtime. You’ve got two evenly matched teams.

On defensive scenarios should Jeff Schultz not be able to play Sunday:
Well, Schultzy’s a big part of our hockey club. His size alone, his reach. He’s a great defender, and more importantly, he’s a veteran presence back there. Again, we’ve faced this all season long. We’ve had guys injured and had guys recalled. Schultzy was out towards the end of the year, and we put other defensemen in. We feel quite confident that whoever we put in, Kevin Raine, Nick Ebert, we have guys who’ve played a lot of hockey for us all season long. I’ll tell you what, those guys have been working extremely hard. So, you know what? Regardless of what we do tomorrow, whoever we put in, they’ll be ready to go.

On Michael Mersch entering the game “banged up”:
You guys keep telling me that he was banged up. I told you he was a healthy scratch. Do you not believe me? [Reporter: Well, bringing him back into the lineup, then your coaches decision-] We had a pretty long talk. We made up. [inaudible]. I mean, it’s playoff hockey. Guys get hurt, guys get banged up. Sometimes you can’t play in a back-to-back situation. It’s not to say that maybe he couldn’t have played if the situation was different with the series the way it was, but I don’t expect anybody to be healthy right now. I mean, that’s the way the game is. It’s hard fought out there, and you know what? Their guys are banged up, too.

On Mersch scoring two goals after a long layoff:
I mean, it was a long layoff for everybody. So, I mean, he had one extra day because he didn’t play that last game because he was a healthy scratch. So that was it. He had one extra day. So, I mean, it wasn’t that big of a challenge. We kept ourselves busy and mixed in some rest and recovery days, and it was what it was. Nothing surprises me with our guys. Our guys, they’re very focused and very determined, and you know what? The’yre very easy to coach.

On whether he has an update on Patrik Bartosak, who missed the game with back spasms:
You guys can ask, but you’re going to get the standard answer from every coach when you guys continue to ask. Day-to-day.

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