Gerard Gallant met with the media following the win over the Islanders and said (MSG/NYR):

• On how Kakko responded to his turnover, “I think a couple of guys on our bench I saw talking to him and that is perfect because that comes from leadership and you make mistakes and, obviously, in an important game like tonight, to give that goal up is tough on a young player, but I saw Kreider and Goodrow down there talking to him. You are going to make mistakes, but it’s nice that he finished off the right way. It makes it a lot easier for him, for sure.”

• On how the score wasn’t indicative of the game, “I thought we were outstanding, personally. We hit a lot of goal posts, I thought we played real well, in control of the game, but they kept getting the goal to go ahead every time. I liked our game a lot and we found a way to win which was fortunate because the goalie played outstanding and we hit a lot of posts, like I said, and you get frustrated sometimes, but they stuck with it and found a way at the end.”
• What prompted you to flip Goodrow and Kravtsov, “Honestly, you look at some line matches once in a while. Their fourth line, Cizikas, the so called fourth line, it’s better than a fourth line, I just thought Goodrow would be better with our matchup for that line than the other guys and once they started playing I thought Brodzinski’s line was our best line. They were outstanding, did a great job and every time Goodrow plays with somebody he makes the line look good.”
• On Gauthier, “great play, good for Gauthier. Skated really well, made a great goal. He’s a confident kid and that is good to see right now for him.”
• On when Gauthier was scratched, “He was upset, disappointed. He wasn’t scratched from bad play, he was scratched from coaches making decisions and we liked the way he played, we just wanted some different types of players. He came in tonight and did a real good job and played hard and scored a great goal.”
• How important is it to you to have a fourth line you can roll, “it’s real important, I think that any good team has a good fourth line. I mean they aren’t always going to be a high scoring fourth line, they can be a bumping and banging fourth line. I think the way those guys played tonight, they did a little bit of everything, forechecked really well, kept the team in there. I like the way they played tonight, it was an excellent game for them.”
• What is different during this streak of strong play, “I think we are just confident, feel good about our team, feel good about our game for the most part. Every time we do scoring chances we are usually ahead of the other team. I think we’ve played really well the last 9-10 games, whatever it is and competing and playing well and we are getting some puck luck. Even though we are still hitting goal posts we are still getting some puck luck and we didn’t have that for most of the first 20-25 games of the season. I hate saying that, but that is what I truly believe, our record should have been better than what it was the first 25, but it wasn’t. We found a way to dig down and when you work hard and compete hard good things usually happen and that is what has happened the last ten games.”
• How much of a benefit is to go into the break with a win, “I think it’s great. I’m ready for it, I know that. I’m sure they are.”
• Was the PP with Panarin and Zibanejad flipping their decision, “I don’t know. It worked, but I have no idea. I know that last time we played them we scored a goal the same type of play. That is what Mike talked about, so I’m sure they showed that in the video and it worked again, fortunately for us. I think the key was the day off yesterday. (Laugh)