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NHL WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: OILERS v MIGHTY DUCKS


May 19, 2006


Randy Carlyle

Scott Niedermayer


ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA: Game One

JAMEY HORAN: Questions for the coach, please.
Q. Can you talk about the first goal. Do you consider that a fluke, the goalie flipping it down ice?
COACH CARLYLE: I think that that type of play is not a fluke. I think it was a play that was designed. Their goaltender is strong on his backhand, and we didn't read the situation properly where we allowed Peca to get in behind us specifically.
In those situations, we probably could have did a better job with the dump. I guess it caught us off surprise. But he's historically been strong on his backhand, and he proved it tonight that he can do that.
Q. What were your impressions of the overall play of Roloson there?
COACH CARLYLE: I think he played a good game for them. You know, I thought it was a lot of positives from both sides. I didn't think that it was the type of hockey game that coaches would leave thinking that they didn't do a lot of good things in.
I thought that the energy was there, and I thought that our hockey club competed very, very hard. I think that, you know, there's room for improvement, but there's lots of positives out of this game. We lost the hockey game 3-1. It was a one-goal hockey game. That's what the playoffs are all about.
Q. Talk about the go ahead goal with Stoll jumping in the crease.
COACH CARLYLE: You know, we just finished -- it was a five-on-three. O'Donnell got out of the box. We didn't get the puck deep down the ice. We only got it to center. They were able to turn it back. We had a three-on-three. We misread it. Those situations are one where, you know, Smyth made a good play, delayed coming across the blueline, shot the puck at the net. The rebound was in the air. He batted it out of the air.
Stoll was not in the crease. He went to the net. He was close to getting into it, but he wasn't. Reviewing it with the luxury of replay for us, he was outside the crease. It looked like he was very close to going in, but he didn't enter into the crease area.

Q. Right before that, Randy -- I can't remember who it was -- but Vish tried to, you know, make head and took that penalty. Is that something you don't want to see at that time because you're already down a guy?
COACH CARLYLE: The penalty was one where he went after a player in the neutral ice, had his head down. The player got his head up. The stick, he was kind of loose going at him. His stick ramped up, I think it was Raffi Torres' stick. On impact the, the stick did come up and hit Torres in the head. The new NHL, that's a foul. That's the rules that you have to play by.
It's one of those things this maybe a better selection of timing on trying to make that hit in the neutral ice would have been called at that time. But, you know, we're an aggressive hockey club and we can't change being aggressive. We have to continually play a chip and support game and grind. I thought we did lots of that tonight.
JAMEY HORAN: Questions for Scott Niedermayer.
Q. How do you feel the team played tonight? Could you talk a little bit about the first goal where Roloson flipped it too center ice?
SCOTT NIEDERMAYER: Yeah, I would say we were caught by surprise a little bit on that. He made a smart play. He lifted the puck over everybody. Peca knew what he was doing. He took advantage of it.
You know, we responded well with a goal right away on the power play. We just seemed to be half a step off or away from finishing on some more chances tonight.
But they played well. Can't take it away from them. We'll try and be better.
Q. It's certainly been a while since you guys have even dealt with a loss or so. What do you think will go through your heads over the next 24, 48 hours?
SCOTT NIEDERMAYER: Obviously, we realize that we have to be better if we want to win the next game. You know, you're not expecting to have a winning streak all the way through this. You're going to lose games. It's a matter how you respond and how you play the next day or next two days. That's what our focus is right now, trying to be better in two days.
Q. What do you and some of the other veteran guys say to the younger players now to put this behind them and go on to Sunday?
SCOTT NIEDERMAYER: I don't think there's a whole lot that needs to be said. There were a few things said after the game in the room. We've been through this before. The series against Calgary was back and forth the whole way. You know, we've been in this situation. We realize we have to dig down and find ways to be better. Simple as that.
Q. The game didn't seem to have a lot of pace to it compared to some of the ones we've seen. Did you feel there was something going on there? Was it the ice? Now that it's over, can you say maybe a little rust?
SCOTT NIEDERMAYER: Well, you know, I think our first period was our best period. You know, I don't know. Obviously when you're not playing every day, you know, it affects you a bit. But I think our first was the best. It looked like we sort of stopped skating a little bit in the next two periods.
You know, playoff series start out and the intensity picks up. I would fully expect that to be the case in this series.
Q. Any concern at all losing one at home? It's already obviously been documented about the struggles up there at Rexall, losing home ice.
SCOTT NIEDERMAYER: You know, we've managed to win on the road, you know, through the playoffs this year. We're disappointed. We wanted to play better and try and have a better outcome tonight.
But that wasn't the case. We have to move forward. We're not going to worry too much about the fact that, you know, home ice has shifted.
Q. Scott, how did the team respond after a seven-day layoff? Did you feel flat? Did you feel maybe you were slow by a step? Did the layoff make any difference?
SCOTT NIEDERMAYER: You know, I just finished saying, I think the first period seemed to be our highest-energy period when we were skating and doing a lot of things we want to try to do as a team.
A long layoff, but not playing, it's only natural that that affects you a little bit. But I think we did a decent job of responding after having eight or whatever days off we had. You know, now we just have to get ready for the next game in two days and find ways to be better, and I think we can do that.

End of FastScripts...

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