Game 4 postgame quotes: Modano, Turco, Morrow

Q. Do you wish you shaved the beard a little earlier now?

MIKE MODANO:  Maybe so (smiling).  I was a bit bored at home last night.  Nothing on TV.

Q. They moved you over to the wing tonight.  You looked like you were on a mission tonight.

MIKE MODANO:  The wing kind of changes things a lot.  I think at times you can really time things.  You seem to get sometimes get lost in the pack.  You can come wide and you can kind of gain some speed, find some open ice out there.

Centers have a lot of responsibility.  There's a lot more grunt work.  There's a lot more skating.  You're down low a lot more often in your own zone.  So I think it was just, you know, let's load up two lines and see what we can do, go offense to offense, and hopefully we can even that out.

Q. How many game winning goals do you think you have against the Red Wings in your entire career?  How did it feel to get that one after they came back to tie it?

MIKE MODANO:  I'm not sure.  Probably one maybe.  I think that's about it.  Certainly in the playoffs. But, yeah, I mean, we've been struggling a little bit on the power play.  It hasn't been really working out for us as far as the plays and things opening up.  They're really good at anticipating things and shutting down lanes, really clogging things up.  And you don't get many second or third chances on 'em, too.

You know, we were able to get it set up finally.  Zubov down low on that side is someone that can really thread the needle, find the open guy.  Once it came down to him, I was able to get off a little bit, get the shot off before [Kris] Draper came behind me.

Q. As far as coming back, their goal in the beginning of the third could have been pretty detrimental to you guys.  What was it about this team?  Was it the desperation factor that kept you going and getting that equalizer?

MIKE MODANO:  Probably so.  Having the lead finally for once in the whole series was something that was, you know, exciting to see finally, kind of changed our feeling about things.

But, you know, those guys just kept coming.  Those three just keep coming, chance after chance.  You know they're going to get their looks.  You know they're going to get their great opportunities.  An innocent play like that up the ice, two guys come to [Pavel] Datsyuk, he's able to get [Henrik] Zetterberg, made a great shot.

We knew obviously it's those two guys that really make that team go.  So if you're able to keep them off the boards somewhat more than the other night, we felt we had a better chance.


Q. Marty, how big was it to, one, beat them as a team, and two, for you to get the win?  It was obviously a big performance for you.

MARTY TURCO:  Well, it's been of the biggest.  You know, that's kind of a no brainer for us.  Situation we're in speaks for itself.  But it was a pretty intense, desperate game, you know, from everybody on our side.

You know, we needed that to be successful.  We're going to continue to have to play like that just to have a chance.  You know, it's nice just to see everyone talking about, you know, in the locker room that we can do it.  The guys were loose.  The guys were fired up. Just got to do what I got to do out there.  And tonight, you know, nice to get a first goal and keep battling after they tied it up.  It was a night of resiliency all the way around.

Q. Both you guys, you know how it is when you're down 3-0, it's the end of the world.  Just to get the win tonight, going back to Detroit, sum up what it means.

BRENDEN MORROW:  Well, we've been through it.  We just finished it against San Jose.  Doubt starts to creep in a little bit.  We got a couple days here to let that sink in.  We're gonna regroup, get some rest, take care of the body, go in there and try and have the same effort in the Joe.  We haven't had a lot of success there, but we're going to try and break that.

Q. Marty?

MARTY TURCO:  You know, you lose, you go home.  It's gonna be like that for a while.  You know, personally, building up to the game, thought about the opportunity to go back to Detroit and play and get a win.  That would mean just inching closer to what we know we can do.

It's nothing short of an exciting challenge for all of us, and for me personally.  I've had a lot of challenges over the years.  This year's been no different.  So this is one where you just needed to rise to the occasion.

Q. Marty, you feel as though you had that one coming from Holmstrom after the goal that was allowed in Detroit?

MARTY TURCO:  Well, I'm not out there really thinking about calls getting evened up, kind of losing my focus with trivial things.  But I could tell you, between the one in the first game that was allowed, and the one tonight, probably trade the two, the series could be different.

But players and I, we don't work like that.  We don't think in hypothetical terms, think of things that are out of our control.  You know, he's great at what he does.  We're not saying that.  Well, we want the freedom to move.  I still think whether he's in the blue or not, I feel like I'm in there first and I deserve every chance to make a save on the shot.  And I couldn't move freely to make that save on the shot.

I really don't think it's a bad call.  I don't think it's black and white, like it used to be.  You know, it's the ref's discretion.  You know, gave me freedom to move right there.

Q. Brenden, feel pretty good on the left arm getting that shot off?  Didn't lose any power?

BRENDEN MORROW:  No.  He found me pretty open.  Felt pretty good.

Q. Were you going to one time it?

BRENDEN MORROW:  Well, it wasn't laying perfectly flat.  I wanted to stop it first.  I missed one last game.  Mike threw one over to me, hit a rut, bounced over the stick.  I wanted to make sure that I got control of this before I let it go.

Q. What was it like in the penalty box at the end there?

BRENDEN MORROW:  I felt shame, like [the goalie in the film] Slapshot said.  Desperate times.  It's tough to sit in there two minutes and 17 seconds.  I've seen a lot of those goals go in this year.  I did my superstitious spin around in the box and everything I could do to make sure that one stayed out of the net.

Q. How do you feel for him when he's out there?

BRENDEN MORROW:  I put the whole team in a bad position there.  But they came up big.

Q. Came up big in the situation?

BRENDEN MORROW:  Absolutely.  He's done it over and over.  Everyone kind of gutted it out and got together and did what they had to do.

Q. Can you show us the spin?

MARTY TURCO:  It's ugly.  You don't want to see it.

BRENDEN MORROW:  I won't be on Dancing with the Stars any time soon.

Q. Talk about the feeling when they tied it up there early in the third period, then when Mike scored his goal to put you guys back ahead, those two feelings.

BRENDEN MORROW:  Well, big momentum shifts in every game.  Coming out and scoring in less than a minute in the third, you kind of think:  Oh, no, here we go again.  But this team is mentally tough.  We fought through that.  We got an opportunity with the power play.  I think a stick broke out there.  We tried to two on one that guy.  Good hockey awareness, hockey sense by some pretty good skill players, [Brad] Richards, [Sergei] Zubov and [Mike] Modano, to get that one and find the back of the net.  There's a lot of teams I think that at the start of a third period, a big goal like that could really crush them.  We hung together.  We gritted it out.  We found a way to get a goal.

Q. Sergei talked about when you're down 3-0, it can be easy maybe sometimes to roll over and think:  All right, it's going to be so hard.  He never sensed that with this team.  Why do you think that is with this team?

BRENDEN MORROW:  I think we fought through that all year.  Injuries to Zubov, [Jere] Lehtinen, [Phillipe] Boucher, All-Star players.  All year we fought through adversities.  All those challenges have made this group stronger.  When we play together and play as five, play as 20 like we did tonight, we have a lot of success. When your desperation level's as high as ours was tonight, knowing a loss could send you on your way for the summer, you rise up.

MARTY TURCO:  You know, from my perspective, over the last couple days, we've been talking about doing the right things.  I think in years prior, other, different circumstances, we've not entirely talked about the right things.  We had a firm grasp on how to act, how we need to play, how we're gonna do it, and it's together.  

It's amazing things you can do, you know, when you bond together.  When you're down 0 3 in the Conference Finals, there's no greater time to bond and play together.  Our situation really doesn't change much going into Detroit.  We're gonna need to continue to have that feeling.  To say it's easy to quit, you know, I'm sure it is.  But I don't think anybody does anything easy in our locker room.