Paul Maurice, Florida Panthers: Stanley Cup Final v. Edmonton Oilers – Practice 6/5/2024

Paul Maurice, Florida Panthers: Stanley Cup Final v. Edmonton Oilers – Practice 6/5/2024

I don’t have a microphone coach going back to last year’s final obviously you didn’t haveu in the lineup with the injury he’s such a Swiss Army KNE for you guys he’s moved up and down a bit he’s on the wing he’s plays some Center he takes draws PK you know 5 on five obviously a big play in game six on the game winner just what have he learned maybe over the last two years about just what his value is to this team well we learned that last year because it it was the big question mark going into the final because we lost him in the last game so we didn’t know what we would looked like what’s the impact of that guy coming out and and he was huge you it changed the way that line looked there were times in the two series prior that we would get up a game or up a goal in the game and the other team would match their best against the one Bell line which is LR and Reinhardt at the time that turned out to be a really good thing for us to the point I throw him up for defensive own draws because they had two Lefty centerman and a righty centerman they can all take face offs and they send up their boys it was a pretty good match for us so we learned then how important he was we just could not replace him and the grow was like all players a better player this year stronger understands the game that we play at a very high level he he can and go up and down L you can always move him back into the middle if we have to but he’s a really important part of of a heck of alarm and sort of along those lines how much did you know about him coming in you have envisioned him being that the video was fourth line Center that I had seen from playoffs the year prior before I came in and then he is one of those guys at training camp you look at what you’ve got well he can’t play on the fourth line he’s clearly has to be in our top nine and W Del was still a young man at Center but our Center Ice was set so it had to be the wing he can play center I for sure um but he just was an obvious nine guy in training camp last year and that’s why he got the job Paul when you guys clinched on Saturday and you knew you had this one week ramp up how did you map up slow ramp up we’re going to go hard these days soft these days how did you sort of map out well we reach back to what we had done because it becomes routine and each of the three series prior um there’s a pure day off where they don’t have to come to the rink the next day and then we do a rehab have recovery office workout and that’s really where we’re taking stock of where we’re at injury-wise but um it’s both it’s an office workout and it’s a recovery day and then the the only really so with four days left I don’t think anybody skates for four straight days the question was would you go two on the front end or two on the back end we didn’t like the idea of two days off one practice another day off being off three or four days we didn’t like and they do like to get into kind of that rhythm of every second day if they can so we wanted the back three days to be on off on and then away we go so it was just a reach back to what we had done and stay fairly close to our routine you kind of touched on this uh after the game on Saturday but what do you think are some of the bigger differences between you know this year’s team and the team of year you know a year ago at this point mentally you know on the ice just in general the team itself and its Health are the two biggest ones is that we you know we had added the defenseman uh in the summer and added St and penalty coachs in the summer and then you can do whatever the heck you want in the summer if you’re not healthy by the time that’s not your team so we’ve come to the come to the uh the last round healthy and that would be the biggest difference just in terms of every team has its own personalities um this one some of that personalities formed last year and then as I said you know I think great from training camp they’re pretty focused group they they were really dialed into doing the work every day I know when the games start you won’t be probably looking at stuff but can you appreciate this I mean you’ve been it took you 21 years to get back to your second Stanley you know what I mean I mean there’s been some Long Summers right I mean for all of us every day but I my appreciation for for these players in this situation that they put all of us in um I appreciate that in in November as well too these kid work hard so a feel it does feel different but I I I don’t know that it’s just because this is the third one whatever it is it feels different because of the players okay right they uh it’s really kind of important kind of what happens this week but at this time of year we’re a small piece now the coaches are a small piece you’re not changing any major Sy systems the adjustments that you make aren’t really adjustments they’re just back to form right we’re we’re off in a game part of our game we want to get back to our form so I think it said in surate today on night I spend more time just cheering up there now you know something good bang the stick on the boards and check to see if I need a new one by the end of practice stuff like that but are you getting any calls or texts from your friends at there at the cottage and here you are I would just give you kind of a measuring stick of kind of how good a guy I am I think I got 16 texts after the uh after we beat New York and Jamie compon got 125 that’s a fact also anybody that knows me says don’t don’t text them he never reads them or he doesn’t answer them or I am not at all tied to my phone somewhat proud of that did you answer uh I did but not for a couple days I don’t want I don’t want to get excited about that he if if the text is a statement does it need to be answered it’s not a question it’s just a statement thank you for your statement use nicer words than that you do the thumbs up when I started you know what I had young kids was unusual for me but when I started coaching actually I didn’t have kids and then I had very young kids so the deal was from 4:00 to 7:00 at night I would never do any Media or phone calls or anything that was kind of you get home from the rank and games start at seven but that block would be a time that I would so I’ve got in the habit of I walk in through my phone in a drawer the vast majority of the time I don’t I forget it and uh I pick it up on the way up before I leave the next day so I’m not I’m not a connector when you when you look at their power play you play some good power plays already what what makes it just maybe a little bit better than everybody everybody else or it’s different so every Power Play has a structure to it and you have a plan for that structure and when I say the word freelance it’s it’s not disrespectful it’s not chaos it’s their ability to create off broken plays off very small lanes that you leave open this and it’s not just the two great players they have but boy did they create an awful lot for everyone else they’ve got a very strong net front presence they got a heater on the blue line uh very creative players in the other three so stru structure for the most part You’ like to think you can handle it’s it’s the and so better word than freelance it’s the creativity off structure that makes them so difficult ground a lot but somehow driv still ends up a lot in that bottom of the r yeah there’s going to be a percentage of the game you have a pretty good idea where he’s going and where he’s going to be he’s not always there but if you score that many points why wouldn’t you be a pretty good area to hang out and their penalty kill uh what 28 straight kills for them I mean that what what do they do on the kill that maybe is different or is it just caught fire right now there is something different a little bit of an older School pressure by their forward it’s kind of a top down pressure that you don’t see as much everybody’s almost gone to more of a patient Diamond I think you saw that really come in um and these are all systems that have been used before it’s just you tailor them but Colorado did an incredible job pushing coocher off up instead of pushing down there’s an lot of top down and then I think COV changed that because we pushed him down it was St FR in point we almost invited that Colorado pushed up what’s what do you see the next year start of trading camps is reg see everybody’s pushing them up um and they on their kill they still push down because it works really well for what they do you know what I special teams really is I’ve got a bunch of really good special team coaches in there it’s kind of well it’s not quite as far off goal tending I do have opinions on special teams but without a goal tending um it seems to me in this our journey this year that comment their power play and their penalty kill has been true every series that we’ve got into certainly when we went into the Tampa series their power play was on fire and it was a and it’s a big part of what I think you have what’s different our discipline in the playoff year has been outstanding be honest it wasn’t last year right but but that was all part of kind of how we got there it was H very few scrums lots of heavy Hing but very few scrums real strong displine and and we wouldn’t have we wouldn’t have gotten here this year if we hadn’t been because Tampa would have just BL the doors off you if you spent all the night the box and Rangers were cooking like we got an Boston had got an incredible run we at a 955 at some point there in that Series so it’s the way it should be you’re probably not getting here without really strong special teams the Rangers t or laet talked about your system and how they couldn’t get to their offense um going against your defensive system and I’m just curious is this the system you’ve had throughout your obviously things tinkered and changed and with Personnel but is this no you change them changed them a fair amount over the the teams are different when you get to a new team you get to a a different team and and you you’ll play with some things um you’re influenced by what’s kind of new in the league what works for some teams I’ll give you an example of maybe you know you’ve got we do Chase what works Vegas is dzone coverage was different in my opinion than almost all of the other some people call it zones which J Diesel and you saw a whole bunch of teams run this year may have CA some people their jobs you see it’s nuanced you have to so you do hang on to systems once you get it down you think you got it right but if it doesn’t fit your team it doesn’t fit your team there’s nothing you can do with that you just can’t go to a different system I’m trying to relate it to the series for you the foundations of the team so they’ve got I believe four players with more points than Matthew kachuck and we’re pretty good defensive team those are the two foundations we are but five on five depending on what analytics you use what companies you read They’re a better defensive team five on5 than we are and we’re a better offensive team 5 on5 and there are I’m talking about small numbers here I’m not talking about but I still I would agree with anybody that say they are a dominant offensive team we got four guys with more points than Chucky he’s our leading scorer so that’s that’s true we’ve been pretty darn good you know we we haven’t we’ve had stretches we haven’t given up a whole lot that’s the foundations but I think this is an incredible it’s going to be really interesting incredibly even series because there aren’t holes I don’t I don’t see a hole in their game their defensive game’s good we don’t need to talk about their outfit as you know anymore it’s brilliant thanks be awesome okay see you guys

Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice speaks after his team’s second practice in preparation for the 2024 Stanley Cup Final against the Edmonton Oilers on Wednesday, June 5, 2024, in Fort Lauderdale.

The Panthers will play in the Stanley Cup Final for a second straight year; Edmonton is vying for its sixth title and first since 1990. This is the Oilers’ first trip to the Final since 2006.

Game 1 is Saturday in Sunrise at 8 p.m. (ABC).

Stanley Cup or Bust! Florida Panthers Moving On: https://floridahockeynow.com/stanley-cup-final-florida-panthers-2-new-york-rangers-1-game-6/

Meet the Edmonton Oilers: https://floridahockeynow.com/what-to-know-edmonton-oilers-stanley-cup-final-florida-panthers/

Panthers Have Unfinished Business to Take Care Of: https://floridahockeynow.com/not-finished-florida-panthers-hungry-to-complete-redemption-tour/

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Florida took out the New York Rangers in 6; Edmonton did the same to Dallas.

On Saturday, the Panthers beat the Rangers 2-1.

Florida took a 2-0 lead on goals from Sam Bennett and Vladimir Tarasenko.

Artemi Panarin beat old friend Sergei Bobrovsky (23 saves) to make it a 1-goal lead but the Panthers hung on.

——

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