Paul Maurice addressed the media after his team’s 4-2 win over the Toronto Maple Leafs in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semifinal series.
On his team’s performance:
I thought we were good tonight. I didn’t think we were great.
We went from such an extreme series in terms of physicality. I would say it was under-physical from what we were used to.
They had a good pushback halfway through the game. We kind of got a little bit away from what we are good at. They got closer to what they are really, really good at.
That will be the battle of this series. Both teams have something they are really good at it. You can expect a certain amount of forecheck and physicality from us. You will expect a certain amount of speed and skill from them for sure.
One team will feed the other. The team that brings the least amount of food to the game wins.
On the decision to start Sergei Bobrovsky:
In the back half of that game, he was brilliant, and we required him to be.
What’s the story I haven’t told about that one… I have to make sure I get the game number right. In Game 4 [vs. Boston], Alex [Lyon] had been so good for us, but we had run hard. The emotional toll for a goalie, we were starting to watch for. We got Sergei into that game late because for me, at that point, the goalie won’t decide if you come back or not.
When we get into the decision of whether he plays the next night as the hot hand who is proven, we are down 3-1 and the pressure needs to come back to the leaders. Elimination games and Game 7s are about the players, not the coaches.
In his career, he has proven he can handle that pressure. He also needs it. He needs to go into that net for our team and for our franchise and be the deciding factor.
Since that, he has been fantastic.
On Brandon Montour’s breakout season and playoff:
There are two things.
The first thing is that he is an incredibly fit man. We had a tough training camp, and he got better through it. You break a bunch of guys — usually, the young guys, who go to play in the American league — and your strong men get better. He came out of the gate very strong.
And then he gets on top of our power play. In his first opportunity, he got on the first unit, and he started putting up numbers. That, in turn, allows his five-on-five game to settle. He has always tried to prove [himself] so he could get out of the five-six hole.
The third piece would be his partner. Marc [Staal] has been fantastic for him. Marc is so incredibly consistent, experienced, knows the game, and talks the game. He is funny as hell. Those two guys have just built a fantastic chemistry. I think Brandon has kind of benefitted from that.
He did the work to come to camp in great shape. He got the opportunity to be up top because he has some fantastic skills. It allowed his game to settle, and then he got the right partner.
On another good Matthew Tkachuk performance (three assists and nine hits) in the playoffs:
There has been a maturation in his game. We took a bunch of penalties tonight. We took a lot of penalties in the first half of the year. He disappeared from that. We had two games where we were at 17 minutes, but that is what happened in the game. Things blew up. He had two games where he had two minors in there, but in the back half of our season, he stayed out of the penalty box. He understood he could drive play and physicality.
Sam Bennett is almost a more physical player. Sam collides at a high rate of speed. Matthew is physical because he is around the puck. He kind of bumps and hits and is heavy, but I think he realized how important he was on the ice for our team.
His reputation doesn’t match his January 1st on — his last 40 games. His game has just been pure production and compete. It’s pretty good.
On whether anything about Tkachuk has surprised him over the course of the season:
There are going to be three levels to this answer.
I was very surprised with his hands. You know he has good hands, but his hands are off the charts. I don’t know if you saw that roll he did with his stick at the end that almost went in. Nobody does that. His production has been awesome.
It is his personality that shocked the hell out of me. This is Winnipeg-Calgary, right? I didn’t say very many nice things about this young man or to him. I don’t talk to players on the bench, but if he could see what I was thinking, it wasn’t very kind.
In the first week he gets down [to Florida], he takes all the trainers out. It is real. The way he treats the bus driver, the flight attendants — he is the exact opposite of what you see on the ice. He is caring about his teammates.
Some coaches will come out and say it because it is the right thing to say, it is nice marketing, and everyone is happy. This guy has shocked me with that and his personality.
It is not my story to tell, but there are a number of stories in Winnipeg about his father taking care of people that needed help. You didn’t hear about it for years. I heard when I come in 10-15 years later. People that I know that needed help — he took care of them. He is that guy.
I think his mom probably has more to do with it than the dad — that is the way it works in hockey — but he is a special young man. And Sam Bennett is a hell of a player.
On the team’s high number of penalties in the game:
We will talk about three of them.
The first that Bennett threw was no different than the one from Rielly. I can’t fix that. That is going to take time for the Florida Panthers to be not viewed as that team. For me, they are identical. If you watch the Boston series, there were 10 or 15 of those a night.
On the second one, the guy steps on our stick. Oh well.
The third one is a high stick. It’s ours.
The one that goes to the net to the scrum — I just don’t feel it is discipline. Sometimes the stick gets up with five guys.
We have just accepted the fact that we will be in the penalty box more than the opponent only because it’s been true for the last eight games. We will just tell Sergei to get lots of sleep.
That has been all year. It’s something we’ve been talking about in the room all year. We are a team that is exactly like when I went into Winnipeg. It was a team that previously had barked a lot about everything. We were that team last year.
We have to take it on the chin a little bit to earn the reputation that we are right men. We can accept that.
On his team’s ability to push forward regardless of circumstances, such as being down 3-1 to Boston or having to start this series on the road less than 48 hours after the end of the first round:
I don’t know, to tell you the truth.
It’s a really focused group. I think it is training. We kind of had to do that from January 1st on. We played a really poor game after the Christmas break in Carolina. Since the end of the first period of the Ranger game on January 2nd, we have been up against it and actually pretty good. We played pretty damn hard and pretty well.
If we are a little fatigued because that series was heavy, it is kind of our normal day. When you look at our schedule, at the end of January, it was brutal, and that was when we started to play our best hockey.
Being in the mud, as we would say — we are kind of used to it.
On whether Aleksander Barkov’s game is improving in the last few months after his battle with pneumonia:
In the last two months, his game has gone to another level. You won’t necessarily see it in production, but that production is starting to creep.
The two-day block off in that Boston series probably saved him. He got some sleep and fluids. He was banged up going into that first game. He has been really strong.
Those two wingers are unusual players to play with. They have incredible speed, as you saw on the goal. They also need some covering. They need some weight to the line. He has provided that. He has been really good.
