Head Coach Andy Murray

We're disappointed we lost the hockey game. You gotta praise your opponent in St. Lawrence, they took advantage of their opportunities, they were very good on the power play. To me anytime your mind is too on your power play penalty differential, you're probably in for a long night. As much as we controlled the puck and scoring opportunities we had, you still have to keep yourself in the game by killing penalties, and we failed to do that. And even worse we had a number of great power play opportunities we didn't finish on, and we were minus two on special teams. To me that was the story of the game.

I don't know if they waited for their opportunities, we had the puck a great deal. But they did take advantage, their first two goals were scored in the power play, and then they got one on a turn over. They did take advantage of the opportunities they had, where we certainly didn't do a good job, so I don't know if they plan to play that way. Because that's a dangerous way to play, when you give our team that many chances. But it worked for them, and they've got to be credited with that. That's two games in a row where we've generated more offense than we did in any game last year, and yet we failed to score on our opportunities.

Do you change much going into tomorrow or keep it up?

We need to be a little more aggressive in front of the net. We need to get rid of the puck a little quicker than what we did in certain situations. I didn't really like our structure tonight in certain areas. I thought on our forecheck we gave some puck movement that shouldn't have been there. We were energized and fired up tonight and didn't play with the kind of structure we needed to have. And, again, the story of the hockey game was that special teams not taking advantage of our opportunities. They've got some top players in their power play and they were simply better than our penalty kill. In our power play we're putting five good players out there and we need to get the job done.

Luke Witkowski

They came out to play. They brought their best. We just really didn't play up to par. They beat us in the power play. Our penalty kill didn't step up. We took a couple bad penalties. They're all learning points, and we'll go back at it tomorrow.

Physical play in front of the net

For sure they had a couple screened goals, and that comes down to turn overs. We had a couple bad turn over pucks. So we've got to cut down on that.

Frustrating to get that many shots but not convert to goals?

Yeah, it is frustrating. But I think we're still getting used to the power plays we have. They're not all the same guys from last year. I think you'll see that they'll start to click more and more as the season goes on.

Defense

Me and Danny were out there for, I think, all three of their goals. That's never good. Kind of a bad bounce on the last goal, but you can't blame that, you know? It's gonna happen sometimes in the game, you just have to cut down on turn overs and try and hold them to twenty-three shots.

Brett Beebe

Offensive perspective

Obviously you want to get as many shots as you can. That was a big part of our team last year. We, for the most part, outshot a lot of teams. We've got some big strong forwards that can get to the front of the net, and I think that's what we need to do to be successful is work down low, get the cycle plays going, but drive to the net. When the puck's at the point, we need to get bodies in front. This game, and I think the game last week, the goalie saw too many pucks. We're successful when we get bodies in front of the net. And you saw that last goal find its way in because of a good screen in front.

I think everyone's still kind of getting familiar with each other. That first power play unit is usually Chase, Dane, and Bershbach. And Bershbach being out, I think Mike Cichy's doing a great job filling it in, but a lot of that is just the chemistry and it takes a couple games for them to get used to that. Same with our second line. We've got a freshman on the sidewall there. But I think it'll come, you know. It's the first game of the year. I think we move the puck extremely well, but like you said, we need to get those shots through. Morrison's getting those shots off, but we need to get a body in front to get some screens like we did for Tennyson.

Goal

It was a tough summer, losing my mom to cancer. But today I was getting ready for the game and I had a suit and tie combo picked out before, and I went to go grab my black shirt out of the closet, and for some reason the pink breast cancer tie fell out of my shirt. All my ties are usually hung up on the other side of the room. So I kind of took a second there and thought "This is mom looking out for me." When that puck went in, I immediately just looked up and got these chills through me. And I'm not about individual success at all, but it felt great to get that and to have the guys there. To be honest, I don't think if coach hadn't pulled us off the ice, I don't know if I would've been able to go that next shift. It was special. But it would've been great to get that overtime goal.