NYR vs TBL: Mike Sullivan Postgame Media Availability | Nov. 29, 2025

NYR vs TBL: Mike Sullivan Postgame Media Availability | Nov. 29, 2025

Mike, you just felt like you guys were on on your heels from the from the start, never fully recovered. I mean, how would you assess what you saw this afternoon? Uh, exactly like you said it. Yeah, we got out competed from the drop of the puck is that I mean, you know, a couple JT just called it a will thing. I mean, do you just look at it as effort or, you know, because of the little amount of time that you have possession and and, you know, being able to break out cleanly and all that, do you see more execution issues with that as well? It’s all the above, you know. It’s all the above. But, you know, there’s there’s got to be a willingness and a want to be first the pucks, you know, to embrace physicality, you know, we knew the type of game it was going to be. That team, they’ve got hard skill. They compete and they skate and that was the kind that was the kind of game that uh that it was going to be. And I don’t think um I don’t think we we had the wherewithal to match match the intensity. And so it, you know, I just felt like we lost we lost puck battles all over the rink. And it’s it’s hard to establish any sort of game that you want to play if you don’t win puck battles. Uh do you have a report on Adam? Uh he’s being evaluated for an upper body injury right now. Can can you tell how the game is going to go like the first 10 minutes? Obviously the shot count was very low in today’s game, but you guys were still in a onegoal game. It may not have seemed like everyone had their juice going. What’s the messaging there when you can visibly see it’s not? Well, the messaging is just just to hang in there. You know, it we’re not, you know, there’s going to be nights when you’re not going to have your best game, but you got to find ways to compete. You know, I thought uh we had a push in the second period, the second half of the second period. We had a fair amount of zone time. I don’t think we shot the puck nearly enough. you know, we’re we’re always looking for the next best play and, you know, instead of getting people inside and getting to the blue paint and, you know, and delivering pucks to the net and creating some opportunity off the shot, I don’t think we create off the shot nearly enough as we should. And, uh, you know, as a result, we don’t force teams to have to defend the inside of the ice. I think if we did, we get on the power play more. I think there’d be more opportunity there. You know, we we’ve got to have a willingness to go there more. And you know, I thought we had a push in the second period, the the second half of the period. We had some, you know, significant ozone time, but we did we didn’t get inside enough. We didn’t we didn’t get the puck there. We didn’t get people there. And that’s something that we got to get better at. Kill the penalty at the beginning of third period and they scored right after in that moment. Did you feel like that was deflating for your team? Yeah, it was. It was because we kill, you know, they they obviously have a a dangerous group there on the power play and we kill it off, you know, we get back to 515 and then and you know, and then they they get one on the off the rush there, you know. Um just attention to detail and we got numbers back and you know, we just don’t defend it the right way. So, um but we’ve got to find a way to push back. You know, the reality is we didn’t have our best and clearly that was, you know, I’m stating the obvious there, but it’s a onegoal game and, you know, you got an opportunity to get something out of it. We got to find a way to do it. The road was event that history. Do you think carrying over on their mind? I don’t think it was today. Mike, the second hole, it seemed like in a flash it goes from you guys having possession coming in on the rush to to them coming right back. From your vantage point, what do you see go wrong on that play? Uh, I’m trying to I’m trying to recall it. Refresh my memory. Liier had the puck on the right wing, I believe. Oh, yeah. Tries to dump it and then their goalie gets it and next you know, Hegel gets kind of behind your own defense. Yeah. You know, I I didn’t think we had to dump it. I thought we should have challenged off the rush there. We’re trying to encourage laugh to challenge people, hang on to pucks, go wide, force that guy to have to defend you. That’s what we’re talking about, right? And as far as establishing the game that that we’re trying to play a little bit more, you know, I didn’t think we had to put that one in. We put it in, but then, you know, we we don’t go in with any sort of structure. They make one play, it goes by us, you know. Um, you know, I I just think it boils down to, you know, it’s it’s execution and and then it’s attention to detail. But I just felt like, you know, in that particular instance, I would have liked to have seen Laugh hang on to that puck and challenge wide. And if he runs out of room, he can always lay it behind. We can bring people to it and now we can create some zone time. You know, we I I felt like tonight there was a fair amount of times we just gave it back to him when we didn’t have to. What’s the level of of disappointment coming off of the three game winning streak that you guys had? Felt like you you’re building some momentum. And then I guess how do you explain or how how do you address a night where you know you’re saying you you felt like the effort wasn’t there? Yeah. Well, that’s something obviously that uh that I’ll discuss with my coaching staff moving forward. I mean, obviously our expectation is higher. Um I don’t think the players by any stretch have uh intentions of of getting out competed. Um, you know, obviously we’ve gota we’ve got to find a way to to take more pride in that and uh you know, and that’s something that we’ve got to work through as a

New York Rangers head coach Mike Sullivan speaks with the media following the team’s loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning on November 29.

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