May 10, 2008 Western Conference Final Post-Game Quotes Detroit Red Wings Head Coach Mike Babcock Henrik Zetterberg Chris Osgood Darren Helm THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach. Q. Could you just talk about the overall effort tonight and you probably figured it was going to be a close game, and just your overall opinion of the game? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: Well, we knew it was going to be a good battle, and they're a good team. And Tippett does a good job and they're well organized and they play hard and they've got good players and Marty is a good goalie. We knew it was going to be a good battle. I thought with the exception of the second period where we took four minors, I thought we were in good control and it was going our way. I really thought that when we took the four minors in a row, I mean we had good kills in that, but the reality is you're not using your bench. You're not playing with as much tempo. And I thought that was advantage to them. I thought when we played everybody, and had good tempo, it was advantage to us. Q. If you could just talk about your take on the Ribeiro cheap shot on Osgood and how you saw it and how Osgood is now? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: Ozzie is fine. I got on the conference calls before the series and the league makes it clear they're going to look at any of that stuff at the end of the game. So I'm going to wait and see. Q. Can you talk a little bit about you have a lot of youth. Helm had a goal today, and you've got Chelios. These guys, he is 25 years older than Helm. Could you at all about the balance of your team and in terms of age and all that, because seems like you've got a perfect mix that way? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: Everybody talks about how old we are, but if you take Chelios and Dom out of the mix, we're not that old. And our best players are in the prime of their career, with the exception of Lidstrom, and he could play forever if he wants. Filppula is a good player for us, and obviously he's a young kid. And Hudler is a good player for us. And Helm, as you saw tonight. But we have a good mix, as you said. But our young guys are good players. We have a kid named Ericsson that I can't believe we don't dress him. I think he's going to be a stud in the league. You can look at them. We're fortunate we have good prospects. Q. At what point did you know that Johan probably wouldn't be able to go? And could you also talk about how your team was able to handle that adversity? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: What's interesting is yesterday he was sitting on the table, and I mean he practiced yesterday, and he's been playing unbelievable. And he said: I got a headache, and it's worse than it's been. And then he said: I thought it was the altitude when I went to Colorado. I thought it was just had a headache. Then I've kind of had a headache. I was joking around with him and I said: I don't know, whatever wires are crossed, let's keep them crossed or whatever, let's keep it going. Didn't think anything of it. Then he went to see the Doc. We say it's some sort of, I guess, concussion-like syndrome, but it's not like he's dizzy or it's not like any of that. He's just got a bid of a headache. So he's a real good player. And it's all about the player and his family first. We've got to get him checked out by the experts find out what's wrong or what's right and then we'll go from there. So in the meantime, we've got to suck it up and find a way to win. Q. Obviously, you don't want to lose a guy like Franzen, but nice to have a guy like Cleary who can step in there, even though they didn't score tonight, that line was pretty effective every time they were on the ice? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: No, Cleary is a good player. In some ways what happens is Mule gets going so Cleary doesn't get the same opportunity. But Cleary was on fire earlier in the year, and Mule never got the opportunity. So we're real fortunate we have three guys that provide good net front presence for us there. With Holmstrom and Mule and Cleary. So now Cleary is going to get more of an opportunity, and we gotta play hard to get Mule back. Q. With that net-front presence, can you specifically address Holmstrom, he really took a beating in front of the net tonight? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: I don't know how much he took a beating. I thought what they were trying to do was push him into the goalie. If they pushed him into the goalie, that would be interference on Holmstrom's part. To me, it doesn't matter. Either they're going to play him or they're going to front him. If they front him, we can go underneath him. If they play him, there's two guys battling. So the bottom line is we're going there. We're going to be real prudent in staying outside the blue paint, because we're inside it once in the previous game, and the goal was allowed. But we can't be in the paint, but we can be right on top as much as we can. Q. Can you just talk about the fact that you're two games away from the Stanley Cup Finals? COACH MIKE BABCOCK: I don't look at it like that. My own mind, as just about five minutes after I get home tonight I'll start getting scared about Game 3. And I've been coaching a long time. I've seen it go the wrong way too often. And I'm a big believer in our team and how hard we work. But we were here, like I said, last year and it didn't work out. And you spend your whole life, if you're in hockey, trying to win that thing. And so you just want to do everything you can to get the opportunity. THE MODERATOR: Thanks, Coach. HENRIK ZETTERBERG CHRIS OSGOOD DARREN HELM Questions for the players. Q. Chris, the Stars are saying you butted Robidas, any comment on that? CHRIS OSGOOD: Not knowingly. I was just trying to stand out there to make sure Nicklas Lidstrom didn't get run, because I could see two guys coming. Just standing my ground with it. Whether I hit him or not, it was an accident. He probably skated through my stick and that would be it. Q. Chris, to get you talking about that a little bit more. There's certain things that you can do not going after Draper there in the last 5 seconds is all right, but when they take two hands and slash you across the chest, doesn't that cross the line a little bit? CHRIS OSGOOD: Even if I did butt into him, it was an accident. I was more or less trying to protect our best player, making sure they didn't get a clean run at him with 4 seconds left or 2 seconds left. If I did, it was an accident. But I don't think that justified a two-hander over the top of the net. He could have went about it a different way or said something to me. We're professionals out there and we can go about it in the right manner. Q. Talk about the chippiness of the game. I know you expected Dallas to come at you with everything and they did tonight. And just talk a little bit about the pace of the game? HENRIK ZETTERBERG: It was a high pace today. It was a little bit more penalties today. Power play and PK. And they come out and skated a little bit more. And it was a close game. And I think both goalies played really well. And overall it was a good game. Q. Hank, how surprised were you that Franzen had his issue, and talk about how you guys kind of picked up for it, especially Helm? HENRIK ZETTERBERG: He's been playing unbelievable for us, scoring leader, and unfortunately it's a big loss. We don't know that much how his condition is, and we just hope for the best. And hope he'll be back soon. Q. Chris, back to the end of the game there. Do you feel like whether you guys frustrated them or not, they lost their composure? CHRIS OSGOOD: I just think their reaction is a situation that happened on the ice, whether Draper gave Ott a shot or not, I have no idea. For me, I mean it was, if he did hit my stick he just skated through it and I not knowingly did it. I don't think so. I think we're just trying to be a tenacious team more than we have been in the past. And we're back-checking great. I think everybody talks about our defense, but that happens to be a team defense. We track guys back for the red line and make it difficult for them to make plays. Yeah, I think it does get a little frustrating after a while. That comes with us being a tougher team to play against than we were in the past seasons. Q. Can you talk about the penalty kill tonight? That was a huge part of the game tonight. CHRIS OSGOOD: Yeah, I mean, we did a pretty good job. I think we allowed too many through screen passes than we would have liked. Their goal was more or less lucky. It hit me and ricocheted off Cleary, back to Ribeiro, and he made a great pass across. Our penalty killing has been a huge thing to us throughout the playoffs and will continue to be. We need to focus on our special teams, and we've done a great job so far, and we have to continue to do that. Q. Darren, can you talk about scoring your first NHL goal in a game of this magnitude? DARREN HELM: I thought I've been playing all right, getting some chances in the past games. Hudler made a great play and I was able to put it in, one for me, and I was glad to contribute on the score for the team tonight. Q. Henrik, you obviously don't want to lose a guy like Franzen. It's pretty nice to have a guy like Cleary ready to step in, a guy who has 20 goals scored in the last two years? HENRIK ZETTERBERG: Cleary had a lot of experience and had great playoffs for us last year. And he's going to get an opportunity to play a little bit more. And we know we're going to do well. Q. Chris, after that cheap shot from Ribeiro, you seemed like you were hurt for a little while there. Are you all right physically now? CHRIS OSGOOD: Yeah, got me across the back and in the ribs kind of. I seen so many sticks, I kind of turned a little bit. I do have a lot of padding up there but it got me in the side where I didn't have much. It did hurt a bit. It was kind of a full swing right to the side. But I'll be fine, I'm sure. A little sore but I'll be fine. Q. Henrik, you guys seem to be doing a lot of the little things especially like winning faceoffs. Why are you guys so dominant in faceoffs right now? HENRIK ZETTERBERG: It's a big part of the game, and it's easier to, if you start with the puck it's easier to win games. And it's a thing that we've been trying to work on lately. And right now it's going pretty good. Q. How important is it to the guys to keep the momentum going into Game 3 and 4 and the difficulties playing in Dallas? CHRIS OSGOOD: I think we learned a lesson against Nashville in the first round. It's not that we didn't play very well, we just didn't do little things right in Nashville. We made sure we did that in Colorado. We really played to our game plan, didn't deviate from it whatsoever and we ended up scoring a lot of goals that way rather than pushing things a little too much. We have to be sharp, play good in our own end, get pucks out of our blue line into their blue line and try and play in there as much as we can. If we do that, we've got enough talent that it's going to come out and we're going to do well. FastScripts by ASAP Sports ?? ?? ?? ?? 1 Red Wings - M. Babcock, H. Zetterberg, C. Osgood, D. Helm - 05.10.08 1 visit our archives at asapsports.com