Mike Babcock addressed the media after his team’s 4-3 shootout win over the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday night, improving the team’s record to 7-5-3 on the season.
On the 11-round shootout:
We started asking them and the guys were in there doing YouTube review to see who actually scored a goal in the minors. No, we’ve got a pretty good list. As time went on there, you’re starting to wonder where you are going for sure. Obviously, some guys who do a lot of real good things in shootouts weren’t as good and some other guys came through for us. That was good for Mango and good for our team.
A real big goal by Mitch, obviously, to get us back in the game.
On the team’s inability to stay out of the box of late:
We’ve talked about that, right? If I’ve talked to you about it, you can bet we’ve talked about it [in the room] and we’ll continue to talk about it.
I thought we started really good. When we took the three penalties in a row, we got off-kilter and got on our heels. I didn’t think we really, to be honest with you, got our game back. To me, you’ve got to play longer and harder than the other team. We were unable to do that. We got ourselves the win so we feel good about the win.
We’re set up with a good week here this week. We’ve got to take some steps. The guys know that and I know that. We’ve got to do a better job.
On Kasperi Kapanen’s performance:
He was our best player, right? He was flying. He obviously has some history here and wanted to make an impression. He was good. We had him on multiple lines. I thought he played well.
On Jason Spezza plugging into the lineup in different spots as needed:
Obviously, with Johnny out, it is a different scenario, but Spez is trying to do what he can to help out in any way you can.
The thing that I think he brings the most is that he loves hockey. What’s he doing at the rink? Sometimes he is a fourth-line guy. Sometimes he is scratched. Why the heck would he come to the rink? He loves hockey and wants to be around the guys. Loves it. What you do is you show the people how much you love hockey and your passion for the game.
On Frederik Andersen’s performance:
He would’ve liked to have had their power-play goal back, but after that, he was outstanding. They didn’t have much early. One of the first shots ends up bouncing off Mo and going in, and then you get the other one that goes in. He just said, “Enough is enough.” Especially in the shootout, obviously.
