Say What - 'Big Part Of The Schedule'

Jonathan Huberdeau on the upcoming home schedule:

"The schedule hasn’t been easy. ’Til the break, it’s important that we take advantage of home ice, and it starts tonight. Obviously a really good team coming in, but we’ve been playing a lot of teams and we’ve been doing well, so we’ve gotta do the same thing tonight."

On squaring off against Alexander Ovechkin as he chases Gretzky's record:

"What he’s doing out there, it’s pretty incredible. He’s going to beat it (the all-time goal-scoring record), I mean, this year he’s been scoring a lot of goals. For us, obviously, we want to limit that, we don’t want to have him scoring goals against us. I think that’s the main goal, but overall I think there’s a lot of guys out there that can score a lot of goals, so I think it’s going to be important that we play well defensively."

MacKenzie Weegar on the seven-game slate ahead:

"It’s huge. This is a big, big few games here at home before the break. Really, it’s gonna tell us where we’re gonna stand here, when we get back from the break for this playoff push. It’s a big part of the schedule, this homestand. I’m expecting everybody to be on their ‘A’ games here, throughout, until the break."

On facing the league-leading Capitals:

"I approach it as a great opportunity. You’ve got the best team in the league coming to the Saddledome, this is what you want. I think everybody here wants to show them, and also the league, what we’re capable of, and this is a perfect time to do it."

Ryan Huska on the challenges with changing defensive pairings:

"Ras and Kevin, they’ve been together all year. So now you’re having someone that Ras has to read off a little differently than he would for Kevin, so that’s something that - over the course of time - you would hope that the communication on the ice will be there from the pairs, to make sure they’re helping each other out so they don’t have to rely on just having played with a guy for so long, they know exactly what he’s going to do in certain situations."

On Joel Hanley's role on the blue line:

"He’s one of those guys that I don’t think there’s a lot of ‘geez, what’s he going to do in this situation.’ Like even for someone that hasn’t played a lot with him, you pretty much know. Like he’s going to be responsible defensively, he’s going to be competitive down low, and he’s going to allow his partner … allow them to do their thing. He’s just a guy that I feel prepares very well, has a good understanding of who he is. He’s been real important for us over the last little while."

On the challenges presented by the Capitals:

"They’re the best team in the league for a reason. They’ve got good goaltending, they’re very deep. They’re a big team. They make it hard on their opponents to generate much against them. So they do a lot of things well, including both sides of special teams."