Things were going well, but then things went off the rails... quickly as the Carolina Hurricanes lost 8-2 to the Tampa Bay Lightning Friday night at PNC Arena.
Game Recap: Hurricanes Blown Out by Lightning 8-2 In Self-Inflicted Implosion
After the game, Rod Brind'Amour along with captain Jordan Staal and Andrei Svechnikov spoke with the media. Here's what they had to say:
Rod Brind'Amour
On it being a frustrating loss: It was a perfect first period. We did exactly what we wanted to do and then took three pretty poor penalties. That's what they do. They sit and wait for that and obviously they made us pay tonight.
On Andrei Svechnikov's penalty troubles: It's tough because it's all second effort. He's always trying and trying, he just has to obviously be better at it. I don't know what else to tell you. We all know. He knows. Just has to figure it out.
On Tampa's power play: It's one guy, for sure [Kucherov]. They've got other guys, but clearly that guy's as elite as they come. Everybody knows it's getting there and they do a great job of getting him the puck and then he does a great job of distributing it. They were good on theirs. Clearly that was the game.
On leaving Raanta in: It wasn't like they were his fault. The first four were just wide-open bombs and kind of a weird bounce on the one. But the other thing was that I've had to put [Kochetkov] in bad spots a lot. I've thrown him in there quite a bit halfway through games and I didn't really want to do that. After the fifth one, I probably should have taken him out, but the game was pretty much over at that point. You're worried about the other guy too.
On what he told the team after game: Not things that I can repeat here. We prepared ourselves, they did a great job of being ready to go and playing the game the way we were supposed to in the first period, but we beat ourselves. You know what they have on the other side, you can't take those kinds of penalties. There's going to be penalties in a game, they just happen, but you have to mindful of it because that's what they have the ability to do.
Jordan Staal
On it being a frustrating loss: It was a great start. The first period was great, but they've got an elite power play and made a couple of quick ones and now you're behind. The third period, personally, my line's got to be better going against the big boys. They scored a couple and that was it. We had the game in our hands after the first, thought we played really well, and then special teams let us down. The PK has to be better. The third period we're trying to rally and they made a couple of plays and it was in the net. The rest of it was ugly obviously.
On Tampa's power play: They've got a lot of options and some good players. They zip it around really well, find the open guy, but I think it was more on us than anything. I thought we could have done a better job killing tonight and finding ways to get down the ice.
On the penalty troubles: For whatever reasons, the bad ones seem to end up worse, so it's a matter of everyone playing hard, but playing smart. You have to be smart with your stick, especially against a team like that that thrives off the power play and gets momentum off it and wins games off of it. Gotta be smarter, keep sticks down and find ways to play our style 5v5 without taking penalties.
Andrei Svechnikov
On correcting his penalty troubles: Just need to play simple. Not putting my stick in the legs and just playing simple.
On putting his team in tough spots: They've got one of the best, if not the best, power plays and I know I have to be careful. I'm going to try and work on it. It's been a while for me and I'll try to work on it for sure.
On the power play: We just wanted to play simple and put the puck in the net. We all know what to do there, it just wasn't successful. We know what to do, just have to do it.
On if he's frustrated with not scoring yet: I'm not worried about it at all. My time is going to come when I'm going to score. It's been a while, but just need to play a little bit harder and hold onto the puck a little bit more and do the little things to be a good player and score goals.
On it being a frustrating game: We had a good first period and then I took a penalty. It was a tough period, the second period. It's not even frustrating, really just feel empty inside. Just have to bounce back and come tomorrow, watch some video. We know how good we are, we just have to be that.