Head Coach Andy Murray

It was a 2-1 hockey game, and any way you cut it, the score still remains 2-1. Credit to their team and how hard they work, how many shots they block, they're a determined group. They've got a lot of pride with that Canisius program and they came in here and battled. We obviously had the puck a little more than they did. We knew that if we played a hundred percent and they played a hundred percent that we would prevail. It's kind of one of those hope and know games: they're hoping that we don't play really hard, and we know that if we do that we can beat them. So a lot of credit to Canisius and how hard they battle. Their coaches made some great adjustments in the game tonight, came at us in the first period. They created a situation where, a couple of turn overs, and maybe they capitalize. But we stuck to our game plan. We talked about playing the whole 60 minutes and I thought we did that tonight.

I think if you saw us backing off or taking our foot off the gas, you'd say the guys were worried about the last chance instead of going out and trying to create the next one, and that wasn't the case. We just stayed after, continued to pressure, pressure right to the last minute. We're going after that empty net. So you know, to me, I thought we showed a lot of composure tonight because those are the kind of games when you have dominated territorially that you can lose. But you know let's recognize our opponent and how well their goaltender played and how many big saves he made as well, and he's a key part of their team. We're talking about a team that went up to Alaska last weekend and beat Fairbanks, one of our nemeses. So they're a very good team.

First penalty shot since 2009

Really in that situation you leave it up to the player's ability because the last thing you want is the player going in to take a penalty shot and thinking the coach told me to do this, and maybe he doesn't want to do that. So you trust the instincts and the ability level of your players. Normally on those penalty shots or shootouts I turn around and don't watch them anyway. I just wait for the reaction of the crowd and obviously when I didn't hear the cheer I knew that we hadn't scored. So that's the individual players, the attacker against the goaltender, and their goaltender won out in that situation.

First period

I still think we territorially dominated the play in the first period, but they were fore checking aggressively. They did a really good job of rotating on their fore check and their coaches made some good adjustments in their meeting this morning. They were prepared for this game tonight. We recognized that before. We gave them a bit of a life in the third period last night where the first three chances of the third period were theirs and it could've been a 2-1 or 2-2 game at that point, so they were believers that if they came in here and executed what they wanted to do that they had a chance to win it. And they certainly did. I mean they played us very hard. It took our best effort to beat them here tonight and that was by a 2-1 margin.

What do you say in a time out talk

In a time out in a tied hockey game? To stick to our game. You know to make sure that we're above the puck, to make sure that we're handling things properly. That was a situation where we had a face off, we wanted to go over our assignments, make sure everybody knew what their responsibilities were, how we're gonna deal with the puck if it went into certain situations. And again, you trust the battle instincts of your players and we put two good defensemen in Witkowski and DeKeyser on the ice, we had a big centerman in Kessel, we had a right-handed shot in Walters, it's good on the boards, could also take a draw if we needed it, we had Elias who has a tremendous amount of speed being able to jump through in the face off and get on top of their defensemen. So it was personnel and recognizing what we needed to do.

Kessel filling in for Warda

Well to me Kessel's a professional player going forward here. I certainly hope he decides to stay at Western for four years. He's a great student, so I'm assuming he will. But somebody's going to have a really good product after he graduates from here. I believe he's headed toward the professional ranks. He's a big body, he's in tremendous condition, he learns, he listens, he battles on every puck, tremendous on face offs. You know we gave him that responsibility, that's one of the major responsibilities on our team is centering that particular line and he did a great job. I thought Beebe and Elias on that line were strong as well.

How important to get the first goal

To be quite honest with you, it was more important to get the second goal. It was 1-1 and obviously you try to score first all the time because statistics tell you that the team that gets the first goal wins 81.35% of all hockey games. You want to make sure, if you can, you get that first goal. But you can't necessarily say that if we don't get the first goal it's all over, because you've got a lot of hockey to play there. And we believe that if we don't get it, we're going to be in that 18.65% that's going to find a way to win anyways.

Power plays

I think the major concern on our power play is somehow to get the puck to go across the goal line. We hit goal posts, we had opportunities. We need to be a little more pugnacious in front of the net, a little more belligerent in those particular areas and make sure that we're playing well in those high traffic areas. WE had lots of opportunities, we did not lack for opportunities. Again, we're talking about a team that, going into this series, had killed 17 penalties in a row so they had done a very good job last weekend and we knew we were facing a strong penalty killing team.

Dan DeKeyser

Was the team tonight any different than the one you played last night

Tonight I thought they came out a lot harder, right from the opening face off. It was a good game, they played us hard. It was good to get a win out of that game, it was a tough game.

Defensive players doing a lot of offense

This is kind of what's going on right now. It's nice that we're getting the production from the defensemen, because we need it right now, but our forwards will get it going. I don't know if they're up to par right now, but I know that they have more, and the defense is doing a good job right now of supporting them.

Frustration

I think we're getting a lot of chances. I said last week that if the chances weren't there, there might be a little cause for concern, but we're getting plenty of good, Grade A scoring chances. We've just got to bear down a little bit more in front and put a few more of these pucks home.

Defense

I feel like we can still shore up a little bit in our defensive zone. I feel like they got a few too many good quality scoring chances tonight. But holding them to 13 shots was good and something that we, especially the defense, we take pride in. We want to have a good team defense altogether, so that's something that we were happy with tonight.

Their goaltender

We were getting plenty of chances. It's just up to us to put one of those home. Their goalie played good this weekend, give him credit. He's a big kid, you gotta get the puck up high, he goes down. So he played good, but I don't think we were having any frustration with that.

Trevor Elias

Goal

My legs felt fresh and it was a great toss-up, almost like a Hail Mary, there, almost landed perfectly. I just kind of put it in the net, kind of got lucky.

Changing opportunities to goals

We're a team that likes to get pucks to the net, get guys in front and hard nose kind of goals. It's a good sign that we're getting a lot of shots and we're getting those opportunities. It's just we're getting a little more hungry in front of the net and converting on some of those scoring chances, and I think in time, it'll come.

In this league there's no easy games, and I think that we're expecting ever gamy to be a 60 minute battle right to the end. Obviously we'd like to win by a little bit more, a little less dramatic, but it kind of builds character as a time and we know that we can win these kind of games.