On Thursday, new Ducks head coach Joel Quenneville met publicly with local media for the first time since his introductory press conference this past May. Below is a full transcript of the media scrum, which has been lightly edited for clarity and length:

Joel, to have a whistle, to maybe bark some instructions out, do some instructing. What did that mean to just even have a whistle and all that?

That was a fun day, a fun day. First practice was great. The pace, the enthusiasm, the build-up of coming in (to the rink) to being on the ice, I think we tried to establish a little bit of how we want to play technically. But, personally, I haven't barked at anybody in a long time and I could feel my head feeling like I was barking too long. But other than that, I liked the enthusiasm of the guys and some of these old drills that they probably haven't seen in a while. But I think we want to make sure that practices are going to be fast and have some pace and purpose. I thought it was a productive day in a lot of ways. It was a good first day for myself and a new staff. They're all new to me as well, so I think there's a lot of contribution from them in how we prepared this practice and training camp going forward as well. So we're all excited as a staff and the players are excited. We never usually practice that long, but I thought they handled it well. We wanted to establish that that's going to be the pace going forward.

I know you probably won't want to belabor the meaning to you, but basically four years, essentially. Did it feel surreal out there?
Did it just feel like, ‘OK, I'm back home?’

When I first stepped on the ice, I went, ‘Oh, gee, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to stand up right. So, that first lap, I went around there, I was borderline. I would have gotten cut. And then after that, I think it was a lot better. I was familiar with some of the drills we did, so that helps. But that familiarity coming back and trying to bark out habits is something that I like to do. And they learned that this is one of those things of ‘Let's apply that regularly and it becomes secondary in your mind’, is something that we like to do, or that's why we do it. I was happy with everybody out there today. It was a good first day. I was very happy with how it all went.

Chris Kreider described it as a culture practice. What is that culture to you?

As a team, I think we want to establish what our identity is. We want to be the hardest-working team in the league. It's easy to say that, so that's an everyday thing to prove that that's what we're at. 
So you’ve got to bring it every day, and leave it out there. That's how we're gonna get better, pushing one another and expecting everybody to do the same.

You've seen a lot of these guys on tape, I'm sure, but what was the first impression of them on the ice?

Big, fast. Good tempo. Both groups were big and fast. Yeah, that was the one thing. And then you do that continually, that pace will even get quicker.

You mentioned this is a new staff as well for you. What's that like, getting to know new coaches and then working together as a team that way?

I'm excited.
I think they all bring something different. I think there's a lot of different backgrounds, be it drills, be it how they run power plays and how they kill penalties. There are some ideas that are fresh. I think everybody's got some experience on our staff as well. I'm looking forward to it. A lot of new guys I haven't ever worked with, but admired from afar, knowing that we're fortunate to have the guys we have. It's fun.

How much did you know Jay Woodcroft and Ryan McGill beforehand?

Whether they're fellow coaches, I think we all have an idea who everybody is. There's some times where we are all together, and you're talking with them or you know everybody that's around them. So everybody knows everybody. It's a small world in the coaching fraternity and I think everybody's kind of comfortable with knowing everybody in a different way. But, at the same time, we feel that anybody we talk to or do our homework on, looking at coaches, everybody has nothing but praise when we're talking about McGill or Jay. (Tim Army) was here as well (before us). They're all experienced and are good people as well.

New systems for a lot of these guys. I'm curious about the defensive scheme, specifically. It's been man-to-man in Anaheim for the last couple of years. How does your system that you're trying to implement differ from that?

It's more of a zone defense, pressure defense. Want to out-man them in areas, and you want to kill plays. We spent a lot of time in our end last year. We want to do it to them instead of us. You’ve got to kill the plays in your own end, and you want to protect and keep the puck in the offensive zone. That's an area of focus, it always has been. But everybody wants to play offense, so let's do a good job defensively, and we can enjoy having the puck. But it's easier said than done, too.

You mentioned easier said than done, to flip the ice with a club that's kind of struggled in that puck possession area. Is that harder to do, or can that be done in a reasonable amount of time, to be able to flip the ice?

I think that holding onto the puck, protecting the puck, getting on in the inside and putting (the puck) in areas that you can sustain possession and zone time and involve all five guys, everybody's part of the cycle or the possession game. Just place a premium on puck placement and a premium on possession. And when you are going to lose the puck, put it in an area (where) you've still got a 50/50 chance or take a faceoff. Just can't hope passes to the slot, that will be a no-no. Keeping the puck in our own end, that's where, collectively, all five guys are going to be working together. We're going to get better at it. It's going to be something we take pride in.

You mentioned the big, fast team that you have. You obviously don't have Mason McTavish here. Is that a distraction on Day 1? Or, how do you not make it become a distraction?

Well, I think the guys are all professional. You’ve got to take care of what you can control, and in McTavish’s case, we'd love to see him here and we're understanding. These things happen. I'm looking forward to coaching him, and at some point, I expect that to happen.

You mentioned before that you’ve been in situations like this where you have a young team, you're trying to get them up the hill to where they’re supposed to be in and that's one of the reasons this job appealed to you. In that process, how important are veterans? How important is leadership within the room to get you where you're going in terms of guys like (Radko) Gudas, guys like Kreider, guys who've done this before, buying into your vision?

(Jacob Trouba has) been a captain and there's been some other guys in there as well that have, they're all experienced veterans. (Alex Killorn) and a lot of guys have been experienced in ways that they're responsible for the leadership department or the leadership group. I think we want to make sure that our younger guys start absorbing some of that and chip away and take some ownership of the team and the leadership department. So, it's whether it's Leo (Carlsson), whether it's other names, Cutter (Gauthier), whether it's on the back end as well. 
We've got some guys that, I think, are all eager to be a part of it and excited to contribute their way. They're good young pros and I think that just keep flourishing in that way, they're ready to grab some of that and I think that's where we can be a better team if they contribute in a meaningful way.

Going off of that, young players go through plenty of ups and downs. There's a lot of guys on this team who are young. 
What is your philosophy when it comes to bringing out the most in those guys and being able to play to their potential?

I think that's a good question when you’ve got young players. Everybody can’t have a good game every night. They’re gonna have some stretches where they're struggling a little bit. I think that it's an everyday thing with young guys. Make sure that you know where they're at. Finding that consistency is what we're all about and the predictability of defensemen or up front. That's a good measuring stick for being a young player. Once you start being in that way, you become reliable. Then you can use them more and then all of a sudden, he's going to get more ice time and more quality ice time. Good players, they want those opportunities, and that makes them good players because you can count on them regularly and more often. It’s a reward business a little bit too, in how we delegate ice time.

When it comes to leaning on those young players, in the past, as this team's been growing, there was a lot of leaning on veterans in tight spots or key portions of the game. As these kids develop and you see someone like Carlsson needing to take that next step, do you kind of just have to lean on some of these young kids and put them through that pressure cooker to get them to that point?

From the start of the year to the end of the year, everybody's going to have a chance to play with somebody at some point. And whether you're young as the season progresses, we're hockey players and we're expecting you guys to hold your load and make sure that you can handle it and bring that consistency. You can grow as a person and a professional, and that reliability, like we mentioned, is what we're going to be counting on. And as a team, everybody should be getting better as we're going along this season. Pushing one another is healthy. Our guys, they're pretty excited. I haven’t been around a group––obviously haven't been around a group for a long time anyways––but at the same time, this group feels good to me as far as the care and the push that could be internal as well, which is healthy, and they want to do it.

Off the ice: At your introductory press conference, you talked about how you wanted to speak to sexual assault survivors and organizations about how you can help and learn. How has that process been for you since you've arrived here?

It's been an ongoing process for over four years. I did a lot of work and talked to a lot of people. That’s an everyday thing and I think as a group here, we want to make sure that we're going to apply these lessons as we go along here, and make sure that on our watch, something like that doesn't happen again.

Are there any organizations you're working with here locally, specifically?

We've done a lot of work in the community since I've been here and through the Ducks organization, we've met a lot of people. We've done some fun things and I look forward to doing some more of it.

Your practices have been known to be more on the shorter side, but intense as well, during that time. How have you seen how that affects a club over the long haul when it all adds up?

You think that hopefully, you're not tiring the guys out. I think you're keeping them quick and fast and you’ve got a different level of playing the game. And I think that you keep them ready for games with shorter practices instead of just wasting long talks on the ice. Some people like to do it that way. We can get that done before we go on the ice. At the same time, we get the habit that this is our pace and we're ready to go. Standing around, don't stand still when you get the pass. It's always motion, don't stand still while passing the puck. Doesn’t mean hard. It's simple. I think it's a simple system. It's a simple philosophy. Keep it simple is what we talk about a lot.