BOSTON BRUINS HEAD COACH CLAUDE JULIEN
Boston Bruins Head Coach calmly walked to the podium following his team’s fifth shut out in the month of February. That calmness stayed with him throughout the short interview session.
Boston lost eight times in the month of February and in five of those games, they failed to score.
For a team that at one point in December led the NHL in scoring, being shut out in five contests in one month, that sounds like an issue to me. But Julien wouldn’t bite when asked about the scoring drought.
Julien was asked if he was concerned about 5 shutouts in the last 12 games. Julien never hesitated and responded, “no…”
Ok, the coach is not concerned. There is no need for Bruins Nation to be alarmed then. Ottawa is one point behind his club for first place (yes boston has 4 games in hand) but the sky is not falling…..just ask the coach.
I’m not sure what would cause Julien to get concerned…..
KEVIN HARRIMAN
On tonight’s effort being a result of coming off the long road trip… Well, I think we kind of anticipated it as a coaching staff – that it would be a challenge before the game and that was the case. That happens every time and you wish you had the answers to modify that so it wouldn’t happen, but it does. Those first two periods were really painful to watch and to see, and our guys just didn’t have any legs, our game was very, very slow. But even faceoffs, we just struggled in all areas. And then all of a sudden we redeemed ourselves on faceoffs, our game picked up in the third, found our legs and hopefully that’s a good sign for next game. Certainly, this was a game we would have liked to won, we knew the importance of these two points, or what they call four point games. We just couldn’t muster up enough to get that goal.
On the performance of Rolston and Mottau Both of those guys their first game – they showed up this morning and certainly didn’t expect miracles out of those guys, but again, it’s always hard to judge those guys because the guys around them didn’t do very well. And they probably didn’t look bad, but they probably would’ve looked even better if we were better around them.
On if the players get frustrated when Tim Thomas plays well and they can’t score… No, I don’t think it’s necessarily that situation – you need your goalie to be good on those kind of nights to give you a chance and he gave us a chance. He was good and he made some saves, you know Timmy’s style, and the bottom line is he was making the saves and giving us an opportunity here right till the end. But this point, maybe at the end with that power play and being able to put a sixth attacker, we never got settled in there and I think that’s where I wish we could have been a little bit better and had better composure in that time frame. But I think, I give credit to the guys for battling through what was happening tonight and sticking with it and the third period, being a better team.
On if he’s concerned about the five shutouts in the last 12 games… No.
On the race being so close in the division and if he’s concerned… It’s a point – and we do have four games in hand. I’m not saying we’re getting comfortable here, but that’s the luxury that we have. We do have four games in hand and at this time of year, they got 17 games left I think and we got 21, so it’s up to us to just do the job. This is an opportunity for us to have those games in hand – take advantage of it. I don’t think I’m really worried about [Ottawa], as you say worry about ourselves and just do the job and we’ll be fine.
On moving Rolston around and switching the lines… Yeah, I think Brian is one of those guys that can play either or. And again we talk about depth, and different positions and we got that with him. If our center position is filled, and you know certainly can play the wing, and I’ve seen him play both. He’s done a pretty good job at both positions – understands it well so that won’t be an issue. Tonight, we had him at center because [Carter] Camper has been sent back down and the [David] Krejci – [Chris] Kelly – [Milan] Lucic line has been pretty good for us so we didn’t want to dismantle that.
On if he thought the forwards could be more involved on the power play… No, it’s just part of the power play strategy. Most of the teams, as you saw Ottawa scored with a shot from the point. You get traffic in front of the net and that’s what we end up doing. The down low plays don’t happen that easily against team’s that have a tight box. So you got to bring the puck up and try to get it through.
