December 31 morning skate quotes: Darryl Sutter

On the road trip:
We’ve managed to win, scored some goals, got good goaltending. The power plays and special teams have been good, so generally that bodes well on the road for you.

On the impact of Dwight King’s return to the lineup:
It’s always good to get a guy – we’ve played without lots of guys this year, quite honest, that are overlooked, I think with Kinger and Lewis and Cliffy and Greener, for extended periods of time, so it’s good when we got Trevor back and then you get Kinger back. It’s good to get those guys that you’re familiar with. They jump right in as long as they’re conditioned for it and they understand how we want to play. It’s not really much of an adjustment for them.

On fluidity of lines, and whether he had anticipated King-Lewis-Brown earlier:
Well, really the lines aren’t always changing. [Reporter: But was that you something that you had anticipated at the start of the season and preseason as being something?] No, we’re trying to get some more strength in the center of the ice, and Lewie has some ability to play all three positions. We haven’t been very good there.

On his New Year’s Resolution:
Yeah, I do, but they’re not public. [laughs]

On what he has seen of Calgary:
Well, obviously we haven’t played them yet live. I think when we watch them, there are similarities in terms of both teams have a lot of young players. They’ve had their ups and downs, and I think a big difference for their club is if you look at their records, a lot of it’s based around Brodie. If you look at the start of the year, I think he missed his first nine games. They were two and seven, so do the record since then. It’s a big difference.

On Jeff Carter turning 31 tomorrow:
Tonight. Isn’t he a New Year’s baby? [Reporter: It’s amazing to think he’s been around that long, you know?] It’s a pretty good group of guys. I mean, Getzlaf’s banner is right there, and he’s got his banner raised, and he’s only 30, also. It’s a pretty good group, that age group.

On whether Anaheim’s efforts against Calgary could be replicated tonight:
Well, the score was one-nothing. We’ve been kind of the other way where we’ve been giving up a little bit too much lately. We haven’t played ‘em yet, so really I don’t really care what Anaheim did against Calgary.

Rules for Blog Commenting

  • No profanity, slurs or other offensive language. Replacing letters with symbols does not turn expletives into non-expletives.
  • Personal attacks against other blog commenters, and/or blatant attempts to antagonize other comments, are not tolerated. Respectful disagreement is encouraged. Posts that continually express the same singular opinion will be deleted.
  • Comments that incite political, religious or similar debates will be deleted.
  • Please do not discuss, or post links to websites that illegally stream NHL games.
  • Posting under multiple user names is not allowed. Do not type in all caps. All violations are subject to comment deletion and/or banning of commenters, per the discretion of the blog administrator.

Repeated violations of the blog rules will result in site bans, commensurate with the nature and number of offenses.

Please flag any comments that violate the site rules for moderation. For immediate problems regarding problematic posts, please email zdooley@lakings.com.