They Said It...
Rod Brind'Amour giving his review of the contest...
"That's tough. We were obviously playing really well, considering what we all have been going through. Then, they get one, and we just kind of tried to do things differently than what we were doing and that clearly doesn't work. We made a few errors. I call them young mistakes. Guys that are out there, probably playing a little above where they should be, based on their situations. They made some errors. Good teams make you pay, and that's kind of what happened."
Jordan Staal following the defeat...
"It was a great first and second, and then we didn't do anything well in the third in regards to defending. We were up two goals and we're looking for the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth. Against a team like that, you've got to be content with moving the puck forward, getting in their end, and just grinding them down... I have to do a better job as a leader. That's three games in a row basically of that crap. It's got to be, starting from me and other leaders in the room, we've got to be better as a group, playing with the lead and playing with some confidence. Burying teams. We just sat back and turned pucks over, and it just got uglier and uglier. And it looked the way it did, again."
Jackson Blake taking ownership for some of his third-period mistakes...
"Obviously, there are a lot of plays in hockey I wish I could go back and change, but you can't do that. I take accountability for those mistakes. I've got to move on, right? It sucks that we lost, sucks that we gave up that lead. To give up five in the third is not what you want to do, especially against that team. I thought the first two periods were great too, and then just little mistakes like that can cost you. It sucks. It's a terrible feeling for me right now, but like I said, I've got to move on. I can't let this one sink my confidence or anything like that, because if I let that happen, then it's going to keep happening."
Rod Brind'Amour if he feels his team is currently lacking confidence...
"You can see it now, it's crept in. We've never had that issue. You can see it. We've got some bad results here. You stop playing, just kind of sit back, stop making plays, stop skating, everything just kind of slowed down for us and that was not the way we needed to handle it."
Jordan Staal when asked about the upcoming holiday break...
"I don't want to sit on that for three days, to be honest, but we're going to have to, and we're going to have to learn from it. We're going to have to be better."
Rod Brind'Amour on how the team gets out of this rut...
"You've got to do what gets you the success and not come off of it. That's part of it. Look, we're also banged up. We're putting guys in situations that we shouldn't be, but we're forced to. They're hanging in there, but they're kind of playing above their pay grade right now. That's not a good recipe either."
