If you don't come out the gate well you stumble. Then you have to try and make up ground against good teams.

If we're going to win this series anyway, with or without Jagr, we have to have all hands on deck. If we give ourselves a chance 5-on-5, we'll get exactly what we're looking for. If we don't, it's short.

I learned a highly valuable lesson in Vancouver about European players. You have to give your stars . . . the latitude to do extraordinary things.

This team has got itself on the brink. We've got to lock in or we're out of here. We don't want anyone to look at our regular season as a complete illusion.

I didn't think we were real sharp, real crisp (early in the game), and if we weren't careful, we might have beaten ourselves tonight. But we did hang in there and we did pay attention to details that can win you games and ultimately got ourselves a nice lead.

Henrik doesn't seem to be in awe of any opponent. If I know Hitch, they'll be ready. It's a good test for us. I hope they throw the kitchen sink at us and that we're able to respond to it.