Gerard Gallant met with the media following the Ranger win over Carolina and said (NYR, MSG):
- Are you seeing more resilience, “Yea, we stayed around…we’re a good team, we have a lot of good hockey players and you find a way to stick around and win a hockey game. For two periods I just didn’t like the way we played, we battled hard, but we never had puck possession in our zone, we didn’t get inside enough, didn’t compete hard enough in the offensive zone. After that, in the third, it was excellent. I saw a lot of good things, we competed well. I thought we competed for 60 minutes, but the last 20 was the way we can play.”
- So what changed, “I couldn’t tell you…Shesty probably yelled at them a little bit (laugh).”
- It seemed like things changed after that 2 on 1 save he made, “I agree, it was a huge save and he made some key saves for us and he gives you a chance to win and that puts pressure on the other team and other goalie and we tied it up and get the winner.”
- On the top guys making plays down the stretch, “big plays and competed hard. We played four lines a lot the second half of that game, most of that game and I think you get a little bit tired and coming in here against a very fast team, aggressive team and they played really well. We held on and I thought the third period was the difference for us and we gotta play like that more often.”
- On Fox saying that scoring goals isn’t part of his game, “It better be part of his game (smile). I think he was being a little bit cagey there. He joins the rush, that is what Foxy does for us, we need our D doing that at the right times and he picked the right spot and buried a nice shot. I thought it was a defensive effort, some good things, good signs.”
- On Fox’s game, “real good, real solid. Probably getting a little tired at times with his ice time, but overall I’m really happy with Foxy.”
- On the 5 on 3 in the first being a momentum swing for them, “I’m sure it was, but I was happy with our 5 on 3. Mika fanned on one that was another chance, hit the post on one, so they had some good looks and made some good plays, it just didn’t go in the net, but when you kill a 5 on 3 it’s usually a little bit of momentum swing, but they had a lot of momentum the first 35 minutes, let’s not kid ourselves.”
- On Lindgren not playing, “gotta make sure he’s ready.”