Ken Hitchcock Play Quotations [Page 2]

Both guys are going to start the season with us. We are counting on them being good players for us. They are here because they can help us win. They are not here because they are young players.

It's a best-of-three now. This is two teams that are very closely matched. Both are playing really hard right now and there's not much difference.

I try to envision what worked in Colorado and the thing I know that worked there is that (Forsberg) had scoring players who could also protect the puck,

I felt we were still tentative (early) and afraid to play a little bit. Once we got a little angry and got some emotion going, then we were able to go. We played physical.

That is probably one of the best periods of hockey we've played in this building.

He's tying to play hockey, but he's certainly not a player in this series. He's just moving ahead. He's our captain and he's trying to lend support.

He's earned a right to be a prime time player for us. (Sim) has just come out and earned his spot.

Whatever he decides, we'll support him. But he's already said he's not going to play until he's 100 percent -- either here or there. Who knows? This might be a two-week injury and he might need a full two weeks to get healthy. I'm not sure if their country is holding a spot for him, but he's not playing until he's 100 percent.

We're breaking in a lot of kids who haven't played at this level.

We played a heck of a hockey game. We played about as well as we've played on the road all year. We fought, we clawed.

We played a heck of a hockey game. It could have gone either way. I thought we got better and better as the game went on. We did a lot of gritty, good things in the third period. We deserved at least a point, and maybe two.

Management has given us a real fighting chance here to have a real good team. And it's our job now, coaches and players together, to try and put this thing together.

When you have as many penalties as we've got going on right now, it's really hard to keep a rhythm on power play. We try to play as many units as we can, because if we're going to get seven or eight or nine power plays, it's hard to keep that energy because players get tired.