Andrew Raycroft Quotations

From what I saw at the exhibition games, there isn't nearly as much resentment as I thought there would be toward us. I think that shows you how hockey fans feel. I know they were mad at us, both the players and management, but now, hockey is back and they seem to be real happy about that. It's a fresh start, and hopefully, a new season that will be a good one for us. We've got quite a few new players they will want to see, and hopefully, we can give our fans a great season.

We just didn't get the goals we needed and nowadays, if you only score two, you're not going to win most nights. They have some really skilled players up front who are very underrated and they made some nice plays out there. It's tough when you play as well as they do and you don't get the win.

I think the main thing is we are pretty similar personality-wise off the ice. We're both pretty low key. We don't get to high or too low at any point at all. We like coming to the rink and having fun. It's easy to come in and talk to him and see what's going on. He talks about kids. He tells me what's going on. It's just a real easy relationship.

We worked real hard, and we were able to control territory. But we just kind of got ourselves in trouble at the end of shifts. It's those little things -- which we have been doing fantastically the last 6-7 games. We've really paid attention to it. Unfortunately (last night) they were able to take advantage of it.

That's the new league. Three-nothing isn't safe. You have to give them credit, too. We didn't just completely quit. They came really hard. We were able to get out of the second, which was huge, at 3-2, and we hung on.

You never say never, but you look at the situation and you do the math. You've got two guys on three-year deals and me on a zero-year deal. There are so many variables. But I guess, overall, I don't expect to be back.

I hope so. I think we're going to need everybody the next month-and-a-half, no matter what. We have 23 games in the next 40 nights. It's busy and it's hectic and we're going to need everybody.

That definitely can happen. But there will be a lot going on in the summer and that's why it's so hard to speculate right now. There are going to be a lot of things change here in this organization (as it replaces fired general manager Mike O'Connell), a lot of (player) personnel changes, so it's hard to say which way it will go.

There was not as much pressure on me tonight knowing I hadn't played in a while. At the same time, if we had lost, we could have been eight points behind three teams.

We can feel bad for ourselves, but no one else is going to. We've just got to go out and battle for each other. We have no choice.