DAVID
KEON: Good afternoon, everyone. I'm David Keon from the National Hockey
League's public relations department, and I'd like to welcome you to
today's call. Our guest is Los Angeles Kings forward Craig Conroy.
Thanks to Craig for taking the time today to answer your questions, and
thanks to the Kings vice president of communications Mike Altieri for
arranging the call. Earlier today, the League announced that Craig was
selected National Hockey League's Offensive Player of the Week for the
week ending October 23rd. He opened the week with a goal three assists
in a 5-4 win over Colorado, including the winner with a minute to go in
the third period. He tallied one goal and two assists in his 7-2 win in
Dallas, and finished up the week pointless in a 3-2 loss to Calgary
yesterday; overall he was plus five for the week. In his 11th NHL
season, first in Los Angeles after signing as a free agent with the
Kings in July of 2004 twice a Selke finalist for his defensive
abilities, Craig appeared in all 26 playoff games in their march to the
Stanley Cup finals in 2004 where he finished second on the Flames and
fifth in overall National Hockey League playoff scoring with 17 points
on six goals and 11 assists. With a record of 6-3-0 for 12 points, the
Kings have a two-point lead over Dallas at the top of the Pacific
Division. They play their next three games at STAPLES Center, hosting
Anaheim Tuesday, San Jose Friday and St. Louis on Saturday. Again, we
thank Craig for taking the time to join us today on short notice
Craig Conroy
Q.
Andy Murray has the reputation of a details-oriented coach. Is that a
good type of coach to have in the new NHL, where so much emphasis is on
special teams and power play and I assume quite a bit of instruction? CRAIG
CONROY: I think so, because it pretty much maps everything out for you.
Everything is just, you know, black and white and he takes whatever the
players think, too. He's always asking questions, what we do to get
better and things like that. For the most part he tries to just keep it
very simple. I think as we go along, we're only going to get better
because right now it's still early, all of the new rules. There's been
some games where we've taken too many penalties and it's cost us. It
doesn't get our team involved and that's one thing he stresses, he
wants to roll four lines and keep everybody involved. With all of
the power plays and penalty kills, a lot of times he's very structured
on it, but he would rather play five-on-five and get everybody going.
Q. Did you get a chance to talk to Jarome sometime before or after yesterday's game and if so, what was said? CRAIG
CONROY: I talked to him, I guess not right before but a few days before
they played Dallas. It was small talk. He just said things weren't
going quite the way that he wanted. There's just a lot of expectations
up there for the most part, but he feels the team is good and they are
going to turn it around. Unfortunately last night they were able to
turn it around on us. Half of it was our own fault. We just took so
many penalties and we kept giving them chance after chance. And they
played the night before, so we wanted to play five-on-five and tire
them out, but in the end, we were not able to do that, even with a
two-goal lead.
Q. I saw your game, are you playing with Frolov and Demitra
all the time? What's that like? CRAIG
CONROY: It's good. They are different. They are very skilled guys and
like to do some other things. You know you're trying to get used to
everything and get more into it. They like to cycle and do all of the
different things with the passing, but Frolov is a very strong, good
player and Demitra is awesome. As time goes on we're going to get
better and better. You know, last night was a tough game; I think we
only had about six or seven shifts together, five-on-five. So it wasn't
a good flow game for our line, but hopefully we can bounce back against
Anaheim.
Q. Just wanted to ask you a quick question, I think a
lot of Kings fans would guess at this and could probably guess
accurately, but could you tell us now that we have you on the line who
the real leaders are in the locker room and what's the general tone
around the team? CRAIG CONROY: You know, I think it's pretty
optimistic. Guys are disappointed with some of our losses and we feel
like we could be maybe a little bit better, maybe we got lucky in
Colorado but gave one up to Dallas and last night we feel like we let
them have it. But for the most part, guys are very excited about the
team. We feel like we have a lot of firepower, a good group of
guys and in the locker room, I would have to say it starts with
Mattias, but you've got guys like Luc Robitaille and Jeremy Roenick in
there and they just keep everything loose. They are very serious come
game time, but leading up to it they just want to keep everybody loose,
having fun, because that's what the game is about. You want to go out
there and have fun. You don't want to be uptight, because when you're
nervous, it just drains you mentally and physically.
Q. Back
when you were growing up in Potsdam, maybe when you were a little boy,
Bill O'Flaherty was a great hockey player and Dave Taylor played for
Bill there, and then you went there later on and Bill was the athletic
director. Did that big span between leaving Clarkson and playing in the
NHL, was there any interest at all, was there some familiarity there
that helped swing your thinking? CRAIG CONROY: To L.A.?
Q. Yeah. CRAIG
CONROY: For sure. My uncle, Terry Conroy, played with Dave, I think
three years at Clarkson, too. So I was fortunate enough to get to know
him a little bit, I mean, more of a little kid looking at someone, wow,
and whenever they would come back for alumni stuff and you would see
him. It was always exciting, because Dave Taylor, all-time leading
scorer, and Bill O'Flaherty were great friends with my aunt and uncle
and the whole family, really. I knew Bill since I was very young. I
used to play with his daughters. It's one of those where I think over
time, when you're unrestricted and you get a phone call, you just feel
comfortable with somebody. You know, Dave is a very honest guy, and
talking to Bill, too, I just felt like it was going to be a good fit
for me here in L.A., and just I think all of those years in between,
you look up to those guys. I think I have a Dave Taylor jersey and I
have a picture of him signed for my father-in-law. So maybe it was just
in some weird way it was all going to come about that I was going to
play in L.A. some day.
Q. I wanted to ask you about the club's start and your thoughts on getting off to a very, very good start for the year. CRAIG
CONROY: Well, I think it's huge, especially for this team, we talked
about it early on that, you know, last year, they had a tough time
getting points at the end of the year. So we wanted to try to get off
to a really quick start. These are not easier points, but when you
can put these ones in the bank, later on when we know it's really going
to be difficult and everybody is going to be battling for those final
spots, we want to have a gap or some kind of leeway where we know,
okay, you know what, if we have a bad couple of games, we know it's
okay because we put these points away early. The
team is focusing on, you know, we lost one game, we want to bounce back
with a big win to morrow night against Anaheim and try to put together
another little string of wins and keep going like that. We've had great
goaltending, and we have to bear down and quit taking penalties.
Q. With three straight home games this week, how important is it to establish yourself at home? CRAIG
CONROY: Well, it's huge. We talk about identity and we want to be a
hard team to play against, especially at home. Everybody wants to be
homers nowadays - when you come into this rink, we want people to know
how hard it is going to be to play against us. And I don't feel like we
were that way last night. But those things happen, we want to jump
back. They physically came at us last night. We have to start taking
the body more and that's when we are effective, when we're hitting,
we're all driving the net and we're cycling the puck. That's when our
team definitely plays with an edge. We're going to be better and at
home we want to say, hey, you know what, when you come in here, you're
not going to get the two points, you can have them somewhere else.
Q. Two-time Selke Trophy as Offensive Player of the Week, do we see an oxymoron there? CRAIG
CONROY: I don't know, you know, it's one of those where it's a little
surprising but when things are going in and you feel good about your
game. I think it's going to be hard to win the Selke now. With the new
rules, it's so difficult in your own zone, I think for at least another
five or 10 games, you're just trying to get adjusted to the new rules.
You've been told so long, grab, hook, hold, hit, do whatever it takes
in the defensive zone; now you have to be more careful and it's
difficult. If you can't stop them, you have to start scoring with them.
Q.
Going back to the idea that you're from the United States from upstate
New York, this is a good start and this has to help you with Peter
Laviolette and Don Waddell when they start thinking about personnel for
the Olympics; are you looking forward to going to the Olympics and is
this a goal of yours this season? CRAIG CONROY: Everybody would like
a chance to play for their country. It's tough, there are so many good
young guys and so many players to pick from that it would definitely be
an honor to go and play for your country, but I think there's a long
ways between now and then and they have got a lot of decisions to make.
But if you definitely can make it harder on them, you know, it helps
your cause.
Q. Can you talk about the Western Conference -
any surprises in the way things have gone in the first three weeks of
the season? CRAIG CONROY: I think you have to say Nashville. You
look at their start, they are on fire. Detroit doesn't surprise me so
much, but there's definitely teams, Minnesota is playing great. But
it's so hard to predict what's going to happen in the next 10 or 15
games. I think there's such parity right now that if you can get on a
roll, if your goaltender plays well, you're really going to put some
wins together and string a good, solid winning streak. And if you can
stay out of the penalty box, it comes down to specialty teams. The
games that I've been watching, anybody who has done well specialty
teams-wise, they have won the game. For us here in L.A., we have to get
going on the power play and kill a lot more penalties.
Q. How about the transition from a guy who played in Alberta last year to playing in Los Angeles, what's it been like? CRAIG CONROY: It's different. Definitely in Alberta everything is about hockey and ab
out the Calgary Flames and Edmonton. The Battle of Alberta, those are always a great time and they were a lot of fun. Now
I get a little bit different rivalry tomorrow when we play Anaheim. I
have not been a part of one yet, but I think it's going to be exciting
and I'm looking forward to it. But there's nothing like the Battle of
Alberta, and there's a lot of history there. And to play in a market
where you've got to fight tooth and nail for every bit of publicity to
get the fans, everything, it's definitely a different atmosphere.
Q. What's it like to share a dressing room with J.R. (Jeremy Roenick)? CRAIG
CONROY: He monopolizes is. That's his room. As much as I like to talk,
he's got all of the one-liners. He's heard them all, said them all.
Between him and Avery, it's hard to get in with the media around here.
Q. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? CRAIG
CONROY: Well, when you're winning, everyone wants to talk. If we were
losing, maybe we don't want to, but he's awesome. J.R. is such a good
teammate. It's hard to believe, I think sometimes you see him on TV and
everything, but just for the team, the camaraderie, he brings everybody
together. That's one thing that you need, you need guys that come
in here, a lot of new players that try to get together and he's been a
lot of fun. From dancing in Vegas to being on TV everywhere here. So
it's great for us and it's great for the L.A. Kings to have him kind of
put in the spotlight.
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