Murray postgame quotes (Dec. 8)

The Kings are scheduled to practice tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. at the Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo…

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Terry Murray’s postgame thoughts…

(on his postgame message to the team…)
MURRAY: “At the end of the day, if you’re going to live up to the expectations and be a good hockey club, you as an individual, you as a hockey player, when you’re sitting in there, that’s where your responsibility is. You have to make that decision. It’s an attitude that pushes you up to the next level. I’ve said this to the players before. If you line everybody up on the goal line and you race everybody to the far goal line in this league, the difference is very, very little. There might not be a difference with some teams. Minnesota is the No. 1 team in the league right now. They’re a good team. They’ve got good balance. But they work hard, they’re intense and their attitude is right. I like our team a lot. We’ve got good people. Most every game, we bring the right attitude with the right compete. But it has to be there for 60 minutes. That’s the start of the game. That’s the start of the second period. That happens in Anaheim, with a little hand-off play. You have to execute the details. Those things are the difference in games today. The parity, everybody is so close. It’s just the focus that you have to have, the attitude that you have to have, to be ready to go, the right way, right from the very start right through to the very end.’’

(on the first-minute goals…)
MURRAY: “Those are killers. You’ve got a team that’s a real good defensive team. They’re the No. 1 team in the league right now. When they’ve got a lead, they’re going to protect it, which they’ve shown here in the last games that I’ve watched, (against) Anaheim, San Jose. It’s a killer. You can’t give up a goal on the first shift, like we did, and at the start of the periods. You work hard and you try to climb out of the hole and you try to turn the tables in the third period, with lots of things, but sometimes it’s too late, and it was too late tonight.’’

(on the game…)
MURRAY: “The energy to start the game, that first shift, that’s such an easy play. That’s just a D-to-D, behind-the-net play and you’re out of your zone. There was really no pressure. We made the mistake. We put the puck in our own teammate’s feet, and it ends up going around the boards. They recover it and it comes right back and now we’re scrambling. Those plays are the ones that are haunting us now, our own mistakes.’’

(on Kopitar going down after the hit…)
MURRAY: “I was worried about that one. That’s a very dangerous play. You get cross-checked from behind into the boards like that. I’ve seen too many players blow their knees, legs, break their legs in those situations. I was very concerned about that one.’’

(on the Kings’ response to the hit…)
MURRAY: “I’d like to see the power play come to life and score a couple goals. That would be the right response. That’s the correct response. We played better after that. We got our game going. We played well in the third period, but the response needs to be by scoring some goals on the power play.’’