Some Quotes

I spoke to Coach Ruskowski and Jeff Bes about a few things, including the losses to the Texas Brahmas and Odessa Jackalopes over the weekend, after practice today and just wanted to share some quotes.

I don't have time to transcribe them all right now, but here's the stuff Ruskowski had to say about those games:

Ruskowski on the loss to the Brahmas: We just haven't played our best game up in Texas. It's a tough place to play. They don't have much of a crowd - maybe 2,000 - but they're very noisy. They're rink is really small, and it's hard... you really have to have a clear mind when you go in there. Never mind what's going on around you, just go out and play the game. And we did that at the start, we played pretty well, and then they started hitting is pretty hard and took us off our game a little bit. But then we came back and scored the goal to make it 2-1, but then we never could catch up. We were always a step behind, and it was unfortunate because that was a big game for them and a big game for us, and we didn't meet the challenge the way we should have.

Ruskowski on the loss to the Jackalopes: Obviously, we made a couple of mistakes, and when you make a couple of mistakes against Odessa, they will make you pay for it. Then we took a penalty right after that, and they had momentum, and they scored a power-play goal, which they usually do because their power play is an excellent power play - probably No. 1 in the league. They move the puck around so well, and they've got such great goal scorers. The players they have on the ice have such great vision, they'll see guys open that other guys can't, that other players back here can't see. But they'll see it and find the open guy, and when they have an opportunity, they don't miss a whole lot. But we hung on, we went to 11 shooters, and they finally scored. I thought the guys worked a lot harder and a lot better against Odessa than they did against Texas. Hopefully we can continue that effort with guys coming back to play for us off the IR and the guys that are going on the IR. We have an opportunity to get on track again.

I also asked Ruskowski what he thinks of Ryan Lehr so far.

"I think he's fitting in just fine," Ruskowski said. "I think he's a kid who cares, who wants to learn to get better. He's definitely getting the ice time now with the situation we're faced with, and I think he's doing fine. I think he's going to be a really good hockey player for us. He's got good size, he skates well, moves the puck well, he has a really good shot. I like him. I think once he gets more games under his belt, he'll even be more effective, but I like him and I think he's going to be a really good defenseman for us."

I'll post the rest, and what Bes had to say, as soon as I can.