University of Minnesota Athletics
MHK: Minnesota Prepares for Frozen Four
4/6/2005 12:00:00 AM | Athletics
Minnesota Press Conference Transcript
Press Conference Attendees: Head Coach Don Lucia, Kellen Briggs, Danny Irmen and Judd Stevens
MODERATOR: We'll start and just ask the players to just give us an opening comment and their thoughts, how things are going so far and whatever's on their mind. Kellen, why don't we start with you.
BRIGGS: We're really excited. Weekend off, you know, helped us with some injuries and that, but I think everybody's on our team's itching to be out there and we're glad to be here.
MODERATOR: Danny?
IRMEN: Same thing as Kellen. We're really excited. (Inaudible) played last weekend, but I think it helps us to have that week off. I think it's going to be tough for a couple guys to sleep tonight because we're excited to play.
MODERATOR: Judd?
STEVENS: Same as these guys, we're excited to get out there and excited to get going. Everything's been set up well so far. We're just excited to start playing.
MODERATOR: Coach Lucia?
COACH LUCIA: Yeah, I think if you -- watching our team, I think we would like to have played on Sunday and not waited two or three extra days. Practice gets long when you have ten days off, but I think it's good because it helps with logistics and planning and fans. And, you know, we've got an outstanding field. I think four very good teams and it should be a heck of a Frozen Four.
MODERATOR: Okay. We'd like to start and get your questions for the players first and then we'll let them go. And, again, we'll use the microphones and please address your questions to a particular player or players.
REPORTER: Danny, you guys outshot North Dakota in that third-place game a couple three weeks ago. They won 4-2. What do you have to do differently tomorrow to -- to change the complex of the game?
IRMEN: I think we've got to be mentally ready to go from the start. I think back to that third-place game, we weren't into it. They outplayed us. They had more shots, but the game doesn't go by shots, so we've just got to be ready to go from the drop of the puck. They're a very physical team and you've got to be ready to play physical with them.
MODERATOR: Any questions for the players?
REPORTER: Danny, obviously growing up in the state of North Dakota, you knew about this rivalry. Talk about your experience not only as a kid growing up, who you rooted for, what you remember, that kind of thing, but as a player, what it's like and what you expect on Thursday in that regard.
IRMEN: Growing up, I always knew the rivalry, obviously, being from Fargo. I was always a Gopher fan. I don't know if it's because we had MSC or I got watch them, but I really didn't cheer for the Sioux too often, and the history goes back -- I know -- I remember watching a lot of great players play and it's an honor to be part of it.
MODERATOR: Further questions for the players?
REPORTER: Kellen, growing up in Colorado Springs, Scott Polaski said his first memories of winning a championship were with you when you guys played together. Can you talk about your first memories of winning championships with him as a teammate and, second, what does that say about Colorado Springs hockey with you guys and Luke Fulghum and Jeff Rogers all the guys that are now playing in such a big event like this.
BRIGGS: Yeah, I grew up playing with Scott Polaski and some other guys, and we started playing when we were squirts or mini-mites, or something, and we always had good teams. It's the same group of players, like Fulghum, kind of the same age group growing up and we always had good teams coming out of Colorado and David Hale was in there, too. Sometimes you get good guys and you know, everything turns out right.
REPORTER: Judd, just -- you guys kind of had a rough road, a little lull in the middle of it. To get to this point, does it mean more to you guys?
STEVENS: I think like you, said we were able to overcome a little bit of adversity this year and that's good for a team. It shows a lot of character out of a team and it's something we're proud of. Like I said, the job isn't done. We're excited to be here, but now we're excited to start playing and hopefully be on top of our game this weekend. And the road was a little rough in the end but we overcame some bumps and were able to come together the last weekend in regionals and really play some of our best hockey that we played all year and that's what we're proud of, that we overcame a little bit there in the final five and it's kind of a tough second stretch, but coming down the stretch there in the last couple weeks of the regular season and the first week of the playoffs we were playing better, so we were starting to feel really good about ourselves. We had a little hiccup there in the final five, didn't play our best, we were just going with our effort but we're happy to get back on track in the regional.
MODERATOR: Further questions for the players?
REPORTER: A question for Kellen Briggs, playing in a -- in a big NHL city, has the lockout had any effect on college hockey and how does it affect your ambitions beyond college?
BRIGGS: I don't think it's really affected our team that much because we had such a good fan base before. You know, the wild were there, sellout every game, we have a great -- great crowd and I'm not -- I'm not drafted, so it's not like I'm missing on a camp this summer that most guys would be going to they're that they're drafted by. I still have two years left so I'm not thinking too far ahead.
MODERATOR: Further questions for the players? Okay. Right here in front.
REPORTER: Kellen, will you talk a little bit about how the time off helped you when you had the injury and what -- what are your feelings going into the tournament, do you feel like you're at the top of your game right now?
BRIGGS: Yeah, I do. Time off helped me get refocused, reenergized, I went over some technical stuff with the goalie coach, Rob Stauber, some technical things I could work on when I wasn't on the ice. When I got back, it wasn't my greatest against North Dakota in the final five, but after a couple minutes I felt good in there, then another good week in practice and played well in the regional, so I'm feeling good, I'm feeling like I did the first half of the season.
MODERATOR: Okay. Right here in front.
REPORTER: Danny, this is your first Frozen Four. Has Judd or some of the other seniors told you what to expect? I know you had a great regional, but just how to approach this?
IRMEN: Yeah, you know, our upperclassmen were great leaders. This time of the year we've got to follow them, they've been here. They know all about it, what it takes to win, so looking at guys like that and listen to how excited they were when it was their time and they did it earlier. They're definitely going to lead us this weekend and it's going to be fun to -- to follow them.
REPORTER: Danny, obviously Parise's playing very well lately. You guys have faced a lot of good goaltenders. What is it about his game that makes him difficult? What are his strengths?
IRMEN: He's a very solid goalie and he's got a pretty big D in front of him to help clear that puck out, but he sees the puck really well and if you get a shot straight on, more than likely he's going to make a save, so you've got to get to the net for the rebounds or try to get in front so he can't see the puck.
MODERATOR: Anything further for the players? No? Okay, guys, we'll let you go. Thank you very much. Second time the Frozen Four's been to Ohio. The other time, in '96, in Cincinnati. One common denominator, Coach John Lucia was the head coach at Colorado College back then, now the head coach of the Gophers, and we'll take your questions for Coach Lucia now. Anything?
REPORTER: How does the preparation change when you're facing a team you're so familiar with as opposed to maybe a past Frozen Four winner --
COACH LUCIA: Well, you don't have to watch as much video because you know their personnel. I think the biggest thing where it changes, if you play somebody from outside your conference, until you're behind the bench and actually watch a team play at ice level and how you match up, it's more -- you just worry about playing your own guys and not get caught up so much in that, but when you play a team from your own conference, you're much more familiar with what the opposing team players can and cannot do, and I think that's where it changes a little bit. Whether that's good or bad, I don't know, but it -- that familiarity really changes things but usually you're trying to watch some tape on the over team. But we've had some great games with North Dakota over the years and I think it's kind of amazing when I saw this is only the second time in the NCAAs where North Dakota and Minnesota's played with the record in the NCAA and how many Championships and Frozen Four's they've been to. Kind of alternate who's best for a year or two and then they flip-flop.
REPORTER: Don, you've got a lot of guys that don't have this experience of being to this point, but where does the experience that the older guys have, where does that come out most for you, do you think?
COACH LUCIA: You hope they come out and be relaxed. I think too much can be made of that. Denver came in last year in the Frozen Four and they'd never been there and they won a National Championship. So, you know, especially this year, does it change because you're playing teams from your own conference again, does it -- does it change the field of this tournament for the players, and I don't think it does for the fans or anything like that, but does it change and get the players more relaxed because they're playing an opponent they're more familiar with or are they still going to be as nervous, I think the bottom line is if you can get through the first period or so, I know the last time we were here in '03 in Buffalo, we didn't play very well in the first period, we played very nervous and our legs weren't going and our goaltender kind of bailed us out in the first. And we got better as the game went on. So you just want your guys to play relaxed. I'm such a believer this time of year, play on your toes and take a swing and if you go down, you want to go down swinging not watching the third strike. I think that's -- probably all of the coaches and players feel the same way, play your best game and see what happens. It should be great hockey.
REPORTER: Don, is there almost a strange kinship between these two teams, even though they are rivals, given that they're both proud to represent their conference this deep into the tournament and also you guys have both had injuries and kind of down points to the season?
COACH LUCIA: Well, I don't know if kinship is the right word unless you fight like brothers. But, no, I think what you're saying is the similarities to our season, you look at a lot of parallels because over the summer they lost two great players that were All-Americans, we lost a couple great players that were All-Americans, we lost some terrific seniors, they were picked higher when the year began, they've got a lot more seniors, but the question was going to be who's going to score for North Dakota and the question was who going to score for Minnesota. We had a lot of young defensemen we had to integrate with our team and see how all that would work out. Seems like North Dakota's had very good goaltending all season long. Obviously Parise's even gone to another level in the last month of the season, but I think the big change for them right now is they're scoring goals and whereas in that middle part or January, February, very similar kind of difficult time that we had, they weren't scoring and they were only scoring one or two goals and I think they probably felt, and I think we all do, that they had guys who could put the puck in the net but they weren't scoring. Same thing happened to us in January, February. Obviously we weren't scoring. And our team this year, we -- we're not the most talented team I've coached at Minnesota. We have a small margin for error. Our goaltending has to be strong. We have to score the timely goal because we -- we can't outcount people. We have to have four lines playing well, our six D playing well for us to be successful. I think If you look at North Dakota right now, same thing. They're a team and they're playing extremely well right now. It isn't one guy, all of a sudden when Kennedy scores a big goal or Mason scores a big goal, it just makes their team that much better and that's kind of how they're going right now.
REPORTER: Don, who is going to score goals for you and maybe you could talk a little bit about what -- what you expect Tyler Hirsch to bring to the attack tomorrow.
COACH LUCIA: Hopefully we'll score a few more than last weekend and it has been a -- when we -- when we've lost, we've had struggles scoring goals and right now I think we're on a stretch of four goals in four games or five goals in four games, whatever it is, so obviously that's going to be important for us to try to generate some offense. This time of the year, you -- you play great teams, great defensive teams, great goaltenders and so it -- it does make it more difficult to score. I don't foresee our game on Thursday night or the other game on Thursday to be real high-scoring games. If you can get to -- to three goals this time of the year, that -- that has to try to be enough to win, which puts more pressure on your goaltender, puts more pressure on your defense to make sure you're defending well, because you can't give up that easy goal, you can't have that mental mistake, so I think you kind of worry more about the defensive end of things this time of year than the offensive. But I think Tyler will come right back in and he'll play fine probably. It'll take him a few shifts to get back to game pace because but he hasn't been practicing and he's excited to get back in there and we're excited to have him.
REPORTER: Don, can you talk if there is any camaraderie or association with the womens' team and their success that they've had this year and the thought of seeing the double-double back to Minnesota.
COACH LUCIA: Well, obviously we're supportive and, you know, we don't see them as much now because we don't share ice rinks. They have the Ridder Arena now. We do swap as far as if we're going to play in a small rink, we'll go practice at Ridder. If they are going to be on an Olympic rink, they come and practice at Mariucci. Obviously we're extremely happy for them. They had a great team the last few years and obviously from experience we know how difficult it is to win back-to-back National Championships, so they've had a great run. And they made phone calls to us, we made phone calls to them, and we have a great relationship with our womens' program.
MODERATOR: Anything further for Don? Okay. Very good. Oh, okay.
REPORTER: Don, you played on both size rink, your players are familiar with playing Olympic or regulation size. Does an NHL size rink like this weekend favor North Dakota or favor you or favor either team or does it?
COACH LUCIA: Well, I think it favors a team that plays the best to be quite honest. For us, I think if we're going to play in a small rink or NHL rink it has to be on the road. We've played good on the road. We've won at Boston University, we've won at Denver, we've won at North Dakota, we swept Tech on the small rink. So we've actually played very well on the small rinks. Even at the X, even though we didn't win the other weekend, we gave up 22 shots each night against two very good teams, so I feel real good about that. So, you know, I don't know if it makes that much difference this time of the year. We've had a couple weeks to practice on it. We just played on -- Tech at the end of the year, we played at the X at the end of the season. If we had our druthers, we'd like to play North Dakota on Lake Superior, but we don't have that opportunity. This is the size rink it is and we know that North Dakota's going to be physical with all those small defensemen that they have, but, you know, that's -- that's what makes our league great. There's outstanding coaches, there's great players and great teams and that's why you see such a competitive league all year long.
MODERATOR: Okay. Is that it? All right. Thank you very much.
Minnesota Lockerroom Quotes
Ryan Potulny, sophomore forward
On North Dakota
“North Dakota is a tough group. They play hard and never let up. We will need to give our best effort in order to win and I think we can.”
On the experience gained from playing North Dakota earlier this season
“The fact we have played them three times already this season means nothing they do will surprise us. We know what they are capable of and know what it will take to beat them. I expect this will be a great hockey game and look forward to playing tomorrow night.”
Barry Tallackson, senior forward
On having a week off before the national championship
“Having a week off has its positives and negatives. It was good that we were able to have time off and heal but in the same sense it would have been nice to play last week to keep us in rhythm.”
On the playing in the Frozen Four
“It’s really exciting to be here and knowing we are only two wins away from the national championship. The interesting thing about these four teams is that we are all from the Western Collegiate Hockey Association (WCHA) and we know what each team is capable of doing.”
On playing North Dakota for the third time this season “We know what to expect from North Dakota. Even though we lost in the WCHA playoffs to them we split the regular season, so we know we can beat them. What happened in the regular season and playoffs is in the past and we will start new tomorrow.”
Jake Fleming, senior forward
On the mood of the team “We are excited and ready to play. All of us know what is at stake and feel very confident about our chances to win. Overall, we are all relaxed and calm.”
