Conference Call: Brendan Gallagher

MONTREAL - Forward Brendan Gallagher took some time on Thursday afternoon to chat with reporters.

The eight-year NHL veteran discussed everything from his contract situation to former teammate Andrei Markov's career to his creativity on TikTok.

Here are a few excerpts from his Q&A session.

Questions from Martin McGuire, Cogeco Media

I'm just curious, with the situation now, what part of your hockey player life do you miss the most?

It's definitely just being around the guys. You don't really understand how reliant you are on those social interactions, and how much fun you do have around the rink. That's definitely the part you miss the most. Obviously, we'd love to be working and playing like the rest of the world. I guess the boredom and the loneliness and not being able to interact with a lot of people is the part you miss the most.

With one year left on your contract, the next one could be the most important of your career. Did you really think what would be the best for Brendan Gallagher?

Of course. I think that's what you have to do. You also have to put your priorities, you have to understand what's important to you. It's always been about winning to me. That's the most important thing. Obviously, everyone loves having money, everyone loves being in a good city and those are things that are important, but you have to understand what's the most important. To me, that's winning, and when you're in a position when you're able to decide these things, those are the decisions you're going to make. That's something that obviously I haven't put a ton of thought in during the year. I was just playing. Now that there's a little bit more uncertainty, I don't really know if we're coming back or the next time you're playing it's going to be the last year of your contract, so these are decisions that at some point I'm going to have to make. But it's really just about having priorities, you know what's important to you, and to me it's always been about being a winner.

Question from Guillaume Lefrançois,La Presse

Andrei Markov announced his retirement last week. You were part of the leadership group with him a few years ago. I was just wondering, what were your memories of that and how was it to deal with Andrei at that level?

He did what he did for so long and dealt with setbacks injury-wise, and he was the man that he was and the person that he was because of what he went through early on in his career. He was somebody that had to work and push for every opportunity that he was given, and he never really forgot about that. It stuck with him in his personality. I think, you guys obviously know when you were dealing with him, to the media, he wouldn't give you much, he wouldn't say much, he was more of a 'show me what you can do rather than what you can say.' It wasn't something he believed in a ton, but when he did stand up and he did say something, it had that much more meaning. I specifically remember one time in Arizona. It was right around trade deadline and we weren't playing our best hockey, and that was one of the times when he stood up in the room and it was pretty quiet until he talked. He went on, and he goes on and he just had a way of getting his message across and making guys understand what was important and what we needed to do. I think after that, after he stood up and talked, we were able to go on a little bit of a streak. It's that kind of impact that he had. He's someone that everyone looked to in terms of playing style because he was so talented, he was so good that he had the respect of his teammates. When he did say something, you had an understanding and you knew that you had to listen.

Questions from Alexis Champagne, La Presse Canadienne

You mentioned that your teammates are one of the things that you miss the most. I was just curious, in what ways have you stayed in touch with some of those teammates? We've seen you active on social media. Do you also play video games with them, participate in online group training, stuff like that?

When I was still in Montreal, we were all playing "Call of Duty" together. We pretty much played that all day, but I was so bad. I was terrible. Now, we have a ton of group chats. We obviously have our main team one, then you talk to guys. I talk to Paul every day because me and Pauly, we like to argue, and we miss that, so we pretty much debate everything that's going on in the world. I miss that with him. I talk to Lehky and Tuna about stupid stuff. We're in a soccer group chat. That's just usually the same thing, the same friendly bantering that goes on. And obviously Webs… You just talk to everyone. As these days go on, I think everyone's kind of feeling the same thing. If something comes up, it's nice to have those relationships and guys that you can have those conversations with to kind of help your sanity a little bit.

The NHL announced today that they're going to have an "NHL 20" video game tournament. Nick Suzuki and Victor Mete are going to participate in that. Are you curious to see how they do, and what's your level compared to them in that game?

I was asked to play and I told them, "In order to represent the team well, you don't want me because I'm terrible." I know Meat plays all the time. He's good. I know he's good. Suzi, I'm sure he's good. You know these young kids, they play all the time. He'll probably represent us well. They better win!

Question from Jean-François Chaumont, Le Journal de Montréal

I know you've been talking about your contract, but I'd just like to know, Montreal this year might have been missing the playoffs for a third time in row, and you said for you it'll be really big to be a part of a winning team. Do you believe it can be the case in Montreal in the future?

I definitely believe that. I've been optimistic going into every single year. Obviously, the last couple of years haven't worked out, but it's one of those things where I have a ton of belief in what Berg is doing with this team. It's players like Suzi who can step in this year, you could see the impact and you could see the potential. Those are the types of guys that you understand are going to help you achieve what you want to achieve. But certainly making the playoffs is incredibly important to me, so it's hard to imagine a situation where you're not competing for the Stanley Cup year after year, and it's frustrating as a player to deal with. It's important to me, it's important to every single player. You want a locker room full of guys that obviously put that importance on a winning culture.

Question from Jessica Rusnak, CBC Radio

During the offseason, you train with your dad. Are you quarantining with him? Is he still keeping you in shape? What's been going on, how's your quarantining situation been?

Well, I'm staying at my own place, but they're the only people I see, so I don't see any friends or anything like that. I go over there and I have dinner. So we can go work out. I can feel like when I'm at the gym, we can be safe, so I'm able to go into his facility there. The two of us have been putting in quite a bit of work, so if we do get in a situation where you are told to come back and play, if it's short warning, I'll be prepared. That's not a concern.

Questions from John Lu, TSN

What inspired the "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" and "The Office" imitations that you did on TikTok?

Me and Lehky, we're big "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" fans, and we pretty much imitated that scene so many times in the car driving to the rink, so that one came easy. And when I saw everyone was doing this, I was like, "Oh, that'll be easy, so might as well keep it going." It's kind of addicting, I'm not going to lie. It's a very addicting app. Once I got on there, I was like, "I might as well do a couple more and a couple more," and it's just something I decided would get me through quarantine, but once they let me outside, I'll probably be retiring from the TikTok game.

And what did you think of Nick Suzuki's bird dance when he lost that bet to you on TikTok?

It was pretty good. He handled that better than I would. I would've been putting up a bigger fit, probably would've negotiated my way out of dancing. But that took a lot of courage, so I'll give it to him. He's got more courage than I do.

Questions from Eric Engels, Rogers Sportsnet

You said winning is the most important thing to you. I think that's pretty obvious in the way you play. What, in your mind, is the most important thing that needs to happen for the Montreal Canadiens to become a Stanley Cup contender quickly?

In terms of pieces being added, that's not my job. That's not what I'm here to do. I think as a team, as a group, you deal with what you have, and for us, what we have is a team that showed that we could do it at times, but we weren't able to be consistent. As a locker room, we have to become more consistent, learn from our mistakes, and make sure that we're not duplicating the mistakes that hurt us all year. In terms of pieces being added to the group, that's not my job, that's not for me to comment on. I think our job is to be players and we've got to do a better job of that.

You did say that you loved what Marc is kind of doing and what he's building. What do you love about it?

I'll talk about Suzi again. You can see the kind of impact that he has when he comes into a team. He might've been our best player on the power play this year. His vision, his poise, and you see how young he is. I also remember the year before, where he was at in training camp, and he's a long way from the player that he was this year, and the strides and the improvements that he made. You take that into account, the player's ability to understand the area that they need to improve in, and that's where you see the potential for growth. That's what excites you as players, when you see guys that are obviously supposed to be good players, they put in the work, and they're able to come out and make some improvements. We have different players coming through our pipes, and you understand that you haven't seen them, all we hear is what the media is saying. But this is an area where we could use some more bodies, we could use some more competition there, and he's a player that might have an opportunity to do that. You need to see it. Potential is one thing, but you need to see it. But I think there is a lot of hope and a lot of optimism there.