NHL STANLEY CUP FINALS: MIGHTY DUCKS v DEVILS

June 5, 2003

Martin Brodeur

Jamie Langenbrunner

John Madden

JAMIE LANGENBRUNNER: First, I have no idea how many stitches. I could do without old-time hockey, I guess. It happened so fast, I really couldn't react.

JOHN MADDEN: I'm not really sure. I know one of the skates that was on the ground made contact with my face. I wasn't sure who it was. Scott Niedermayer was on the ground and so was Adam Oates, and I think he was trying to use his legs to get Niedermayer off of him and his skate came up and kicked me in the face.

JOHN MADDEN: Well, that was the trainer's choice to put the visor on to give it some protection. I couldn't see anything. I can't wear that. It felt more dangerous being out there. I wasn't picking up things real quick. I took the visor off after the first period.

JOHN MADDEN: Well, I think that's exactly what happened. I think the first one to two wins the Cup, but the refs had a tough job out there. They let us determine the outcome of the hockey game rather than one of the referees.

JAMIE LANGENBRUNNER: I would say probably the strangest would have to be Gionta's goal, obviously the second one. The first one didn't count. Why they went our way, it's just the way hockey is. Their first or second goal on Marty in Anaheim, you'll never see that in an NHL game. That happens. It's how we stayed with it tonight that helped us, not just the bounces.

JOHN MADDEN: I was saying before when I went down on the ground, Scott Niedermayer came in, I really couldn't see what was going on, but Adam Oates and Niedermayer were on the ground. I'm not 100 percent sure whose skate hit me, but it looked like Oates tried to push off on Niedermayer and his skate kicked me in the face.

JOHN MADDEN: We find we're a better hockey club when we take the body. It creates room for some of our better players. We did a good job taking the body. I think the physical part was because we were reading the plays well and stepping up or forechecking a little bit and getting them in the funnels and doing some good things there.

MARTIN BRODEUR: It's definitely up for grabs for us. We put ourselves in a great situation. Think about what we accomplished in the last ten years. We're busy enough trying to solve this problem here. They're playing some good hockey. They're building. We want to focus our energy on that more. Definitely it's an exciting opportunity to really show the world how dominant we were for the last ten years or so.

MARTIN BRODEUR: That was unbelievable. What a weird game. I'm really thankful for my offense. You usually don't say that too often because they don't score too many goals. It was unbelievable. I felt like I had two boxing gloves in my hands. I'm sure Giguere felt the same way too. Definitely we got more goals, and we're really happy about that win.

JAMIE LANGENBRUNNER: Because I'm not an offensive player. That's the way it seems to work. I think our team has kept it simple all playoffs. I have been given a lot of opportunities to play with some great players in some key situations. I have been able to find a few bounces. Why? I don't know. It's just my time, I guess. Sometimes it goes in. Sometimes it doesn't. Right now I just feel confident. I feel like I'm eventually going to score even when it's not going well.

JOHN MADDEN: That's been a team goal, especially now that we have been using two lines against that line. So, it's been -- everybody's done their job. When he's in certain areas of the ice, we just take care of him there. When all else fails, we rely on Marty.

JAMIE LANGENBRUNNER: You hit it right there. For us it was just sticking with it. There was a few bounces in Anaheim that didn't go our way. We didn't let that bother us. We didn't let that put us down and say maybe it's not our turn. Tonight we got a few fortunate bounces. Hopefully we'll continue sticking with it and a few more bounces will come our way.

JAMIE LANGENBRUNNER: I think this team always feels confident. We did all year when nobody had given us a whole lot of chance. This team, from the start, has shown a lot of confidence in itself and believed in each other. When you have that belief, you can overcome a lot of things.

JAMIE LANGENBRUNNER: Well, I think we've got to bring that mind-set. It's all in the mind. It's just having that heart and determination that nothing is going to stop you from getting there. It seems like at home, we've done a better job of that than there where they make it harder on us. It's having that mind-set coming out right from the start.

MARTIN BRODEUR: He played well. He's got a big body, big man. Loves to go out and hit. He creates a lot of room for other players. I think he keeps everybody on their toes a little bit. Definitely, he's really a great team guy. It's definitely nice to have him in the locker room also. He cares a lot about us and about the game, and definitely it's nice for him that he was able to recover from his injury and come and play in the Stanley Cup Finals.

JOHN MADDEN: Absolutely. He brings a lot of energy to the dressing room first. On the bench he's standing up. When he's out there he's going 100 miles an hour. He's great, especially in a series like this where fresh legs, you can use them. When Rupp stepped in, he did the same thing. Any time you get fresh legs, it's a good thing.

MARTIN BRODEUR: I think we're going on the road to a place that wasn't really kind to us so far in the series. It kind of makes us want to do it. I think the pressure definitely is on them knowing how they play in their building. They feel good about themselves. We're going to try to ruin that. That's one thing, we had a lot of pressure being in front of our fans in Game 6 in Colorado. They came out and played hard. They played well and took advantage of the bounces they got and definitely we're going to need to do the same thing. It's not going to be an easy game. They feel pretty good about playing in their building and they feel they could push that to Game 7. We'll try everything in our power not to do that. Definitely, it's we're going to try to draw back on that a little bit. Not too much, because it wasn't really a pleasant Finals for us.