Randy Carlyle Game Quotations

This is the worst game we've played in a long time. But was it the worst game we played or the best game they played? They did some things that forced us out of our comfort zone, for sure.

I thought we were in control. Then all of a sudden, we got into a few penalty problems in the third. They had life, but I give our guys credit. We were resilient and stuck with our game plan.

It's even stricter. It's been very evident, on any of the games that you've watched since we've come out of the (Olympic) break. The other night was a prime example of that. Some of the calls were stricter enforcement of the letter of the law that it was at the beginning.

We got beat by a very special player. He did everything he had to do to dominate the game in the goal-scoring department. He's a dominant young player. He's the real deal.

It was more of a complete game for our hockey club, and a 'character builder' because of the number of bodies we have out of our lineup,

When you lose the shootout, you feel like you lost the hockey game, ... But we didn't lose the hockey game. We lost a point and they gained a point. That's the reality of it.

I thought it was a masterpiece. It was a game where we were able to get things going in a positive direction after the first shift. We had a few miscues and we took a penalty right off the bat, but we were able to regroup and get enough pucks past their goaltenders.

It's always difficult to travel that far. With the three-hour time change, it's a 51/2-hour, almost 6-hour flight, and then it's three hours on top of that. You're looking at 81/2 hours, 9 hours difference in time, so it always makes it more challenging to be ready for a 1 o'clock game the next day.

The officials have set the standard. We cannot be in the penalty box as much as we were (in Game 2).

It's hard to be critical of our group because things have gone so well. We've worked so hard and then we have a game like this where we weren't as sharp as we have been. I'm not going to criticize our team for this hockey game.

I thought we did a lot of good things. We're not down but we understand this is the type of game we have to play.

Our players worked extremely hard. It was a fast-paced game, and it wasn't no-hit hockey. It was a physical game and those are tough ones to play.

We're doing something other than going out on the ice. We just felt that with our travel schedule and the games that it was getting monotonous, redundant. What we're trying to do is just bring everybody down, regroup and focus. The mental preparation is as big as the physical preparation when you're stepping into this Game 7 scenario.

Nothing changes. One game at a time. We're not in a position to do anything more than try to improve where we are in the standings and improve our position for the playoffs. We're going to continue to push in that direction.

We didn't have a very good start. You get down 2-0, it was one of those games that they were better than we were early, by far.

We battled hard - there's too many positives out of this game to get down.

Obviously, their game plan was to go after our skill players, and that's posturing for the playoffs. That's the way the playoffs are. You earn every inch of space on the ice. I think the officials are going to have to take control of some of the situations. I thought they did a heck of a job tonight in that respect.

They didn't panic. Down 3-0 and 4-1, they still found a way to claw back. They deserve all the credit in the world because they stuck to the game plan and never wavered.

Their game plan obviously was to go after some of our so-called skill players. The officials have to take control in a situation like this, and they did a very good job.