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Luc Robitaille Press conference from Oct. 13, 1999
Posted: Thursday October 14, 1999 10:03 PM
Question: Just wanted to talk to you about the new overtime format. You had your first experience with it on Saturday in a 2-2 tie with Washington. You had four shots in overtime; they had three. Seemed like there were more scoring chances, but so far this season there's only been one win in 13 overtime games. What's your general reaction to the new format and what would you attribute to the few wins? Luc Robitaille: : I don't know about the few wins. Maybe the goalies are too good (laughter). We're getting a lot of good scoring chances. It's funny you ask me that. After the game, we had a couple players that weren't dressed that night. They came down, had big smiles on their faces. They couldn't believe how much fun it was to watch that overtime. I think especially the games where you're playing against the other Conference where if you lose, it doesn't really mean anything, you can really go after that second point. I think you're going to see a lot of good scoring opportunities, really up-and-down play. We actually watched the Carolina-Calgary game Monday. I know they ended up tied. It was a lot of fun to watch I think for any fan that's out there, especially in the US, they're going to enjoy that. They don't understand the way we kind of grew up with it. Even the people in Canada are going to enjoy it. It's open hockey. I think it's fun. Question: Mike Ricci is the only guy that scored for San Jose. He said the same thing you did: The goalies are too good. They keep changing the rules to increase the scoring; maybe the goalies are kind of taking it personally and stepping up their game a bit also? Luc Robitaille: : It's just the talent level. They play a different style, the goalies, as they used to. They're much bigger today. Most of them slide with that butterfly. The bottom of the net is always covered. Anytime you got a scramble in front of the net, a lot of times you're getting pushed, you don't have time to lean on a shot to really roof it. The goalies are stopping a lot of pucks that they don't see. I think that's the biggest thing right now, goalies are really good at covering their angles. Question: When you were in New York, did you learn anything about sort of neutralizing the aging process from watching Messier day in and day out? Luc Robitaille: : You know, obviously I played with him, learned a lot from him. He really took the game seriously. He lived for this game. Most of us do the same thing. I think the big thing, big change for me, was when I came here in LA, got on the new program, trying to get a lot stronger, and at the same time gain some speed on my first three or four strides. In the meantime, you know, I knew everybody was a lot bigger, so I tried to gain weight doing all that. It worked out. I think that's been the biggest change for me. Question: You guys are off to a good start, I know it's early, you haven't faced a so-called Western Conference powerhouse team. In the locker room, is there a sense you guys can compete with anyone? Luc Robitaille: : Yeah. I do know that the teams like Dallas and Detroit and I'd even put San Jose in that pool, I think they're really good teams. We believe we can compete with them. I think goaltending is the key and your defensemen. We certainly have the defensemen with Blake and Norstrom. We have a good five or six defensemen. You want to win in the big games and you need that. I believe that's what we can do right now. That's why I believe we can win. Question: What's the biggest difference between this year and last year, Palffy is on the team? Luc Robitaille: : We get Ziggy and Smolinski on the other line, it just brings us a lot more opportunity offensively. We got that much more talent up front that now when we get a power-play, you know, we have more opportunities. Our skill level is higher this year. I think that's the biggest difference. Question: 20 goals short of "Rocket" Richard, for a kid who grew up in Montreal, how does that make you feel? You played almost the same number of games and you're 20 short.
Luc Robitaille: : I didn't know that. That certainly was the guy, you know, he's certainly a special player. He's more than a player to most of us back there. To be near him in any kind of statistic is pretty special. It certainly would be an honor if I could pass him. Question: You have one more goal, but they have a game in hand on you, the Flames. I'm just wondering what the differences are, was it having Larry last year and having Andy Murray, who we all know from the Canadian national program, what has Andy brought to the team and what sort of changed around there? Luc Robitaille: : I think the big thing for us is once we had changed the coach at the end of the year, we knew Larry wasn't coming back, Dave Taylor met with a lot of veterans and asked every one of us what we thought would help with the team in the future and coaching. We all wanted the same thing. We wanted more discipline and we wanted, you know, just a little bit more drive on a day-in and day-out basis. When Andy came here from the first day, the get-go, that's what we had. We had a little bit more discipline and more organization. On the other hand, we had a lot more communication, too. It's been great so far. I mean, every day we work real hard, but yet every player knows what's expected from him. It's been a lot of fun for us here. Question: Is practice as tough as they were with the national team? I remember when Kariya came here, he wanted to pack it up and go home. Luc Robitaille: : They're tough, really intense. The good thing about Andy, he's good at communicating with the veterans. He's asking us how we feel, but yet he wants us to work hard every day. From the first practice we had at camp, we've been doing that. That's the reason we're where we are right now. Question: You guys were in the new building last night for the first time to skate. You guys had taken a tour of it earlier. What are your thoughts? What about this place? Luc Robitaille: : It's really an amazing building. You could tell they spent a little more money than everybody else (laughter). It's amazing what they've done with this building. It's very impressive. We really enjoyed practicing there yesterday. It's going to be fun to start playing there. I mean, it was impressive. We actually had a real bad practice because we kept looking around (laughter). Question: Do you think that there's going to be a difference in home ice advantage going from the Forum to the new place? Luc Robitaille: : No, not really. I mean, you know, we feel it's our building. I don't think that's going to be a disadvantage. I think it's going to be an advantage for us because we're pretty excited about what's going on. That's the way we all feel about it.
Question: When David mentioned it's the first time you've been player of the week since 1992-93. Obviously you've gone through a lot since that period, you've been traded, the years in New York, did you ever expect to be traded the first time and were you hurt by the criticism that you got in New York when you had some seasons that weren't up to maybe your track record? Luc Robitaille: : No. I mean, you know, those were tough years in New York. I really enjoyed playing there. I enjoyed the group of guys we had. You know, it was one of those situations where I didn't get injured for like eight or nine years in a row. Then suddenly for like three or four years in a row, I got injured every time I turned around, it seemed like. It was just a tough situation there. But then, yet, I learned a lot. I learned a lot, how to handle a different situation. Those are memories I'll never forget. For sure, I'm taking that today and trying to make it a positive. But I enjoyed playing in New York. It's a great city, great people there. Question: You were so entrenched in this organization the first time around. Did you ever think you were going to be traded? Luc Robitaille: : I knew at the time something was going to happen. I had heard some rumors and stuff like that. I had the opportunity to talk a little bit at the time to Bruce, so I knew maybe something might happen. Still, you know, anytime you play with an organization for so long, then you move, it's never easy. Question: You mentioned the defense earlier. I was wondering if you could talk about Mattias Norstrom. He missed all the training camp, but the other night in Washington I think it was the first start of the game. What does he bring to this team? Luc Robitaille: : This is a guy that works 150 percent every night, he gives everything he has. For us, when he wasn't there and the negotiations were hard, we wanted to get him because we know he's a big addition to our team. The first thing that he brings, he gives a chance for Rob Blake to come up in the play every time that we have an opportunity. This is a guy that never gets beat one-on-one, never gives any scoring chance when the other team's on the ice. He's a big addition to our team. For us to win, we need a guy like that. Question: Your line has been responsible for 13 of the 14 goals, any concern on the team that some of the other lines seem to be a little snake-bitten? Luc Robitaille: : No. I think it all goes in cycles. You know, if one line starts scoring, then probably next week it will be the other line. That's what the team game is about. You see that through the history of the game. We've all been around long enough to know it's not going to last forever. We're not going to get three, four goals every game. If every line does their job, we know that's how our team is going to get better. We do know the only reason for us to win and to go a long way, we need at least two, three lines to score. That's one thing for sure we worked real hard this week on. These guys are good players; they're going to score. Question: What is a good goal-scorer in this league now? Used to be if you scored 50, now it's 40. Is 30 a real good goal-scorer?
Luc Robitaille: : I don't know. You'd have to go to arbitration and find out (laughter). I don't know what the title is, but I do know that scoring 30 goals today is a lot different than the way it was seven or eight years ago. It's a lot harder. Like I said before, the goalies are so much better, the defensemen, the fourth and fifth and sixth defensemen are quicker and bigger than they ever were in the past. If they were bigger in the past, they could never skate the way they're skating today. I think that's the biggest thing today, players are a lot harder to play against. Question: Are you ever going to lose the knock that you're not a great skater? Luc Robitaille: : Probably not, but I can live with that (laughter). Question: What you were saying about New York, it's a tough city to play in as far as the media pressure and things like that. Seemed at times obviously you weren't putting the puck in as much as you were back in the early years in L.A. Kind of a struggle for you. You didn't seem all that happy, correct me if I'm wrong. How much happier are you now to be back in LA? Luc Robitaille: : It's not that I didn't like New York. I really enjoyed New York, I enjoyed the team. It was just a different situation. My ice time was a lot less. I tried to work around that and work as hard as I could. Maybe I forgot that sometimes it's still a game, you've got to enjoy it. At the time I put a lot of pressure on myself trying to be the player that you always think you can be. You know, the pressure or the press, I mean, I always feel as a player, you have to put your own pressure on, you know, to do what think you can do best. I don't need anybody or any press to put pressure on me. That's the way I looked at it while I was there. Question: At this point in your career, looking back, would you consider yourself a Hall of Famer? Luc Robitaille: : I don't know. I've never thought about that. I play every game like it's my last game. We'll see what happens at the end. Those guys in the Hall of Fame are pretty big names. I've never looked at myself that way. Question: Talking earlier about you scoring, possibly passing "Rocket". Growing up in Montreal, you come in as a really late-round pick, could you have imagined being in the League this long and then being where you are on the all-time goal scoring list, just what you've accomplished? Luc Robitaille: : If I would have told somebody that I was going to be 20 goals from "Rocket" Richard, they would look at me like, "Are you nuts?" That's how far it was. It's pretty special that we're even able to talk about it today. That's something I never even thought about. Question: How did you look at yourself when you were drafted? Did you think you had a legitimate chance to make the NHL or did you think it was a long shot? Luc Robitaille: : That's the way I looked at it. Obviously, I'm not going to say I thought for sure I'd make it. The way I looked at it, when I heard my name in the draft, I just thought to myself, "I have a chance, my name is on the list." That's the only thing I kept thinking. "I have a chance. They're going to have to look at me for at least two, three years. Here we go. This is my shot. I'm not going to miss it." I didn't care. Obviously it's a lot more fun if you're drafted in the first round and everybody is there. At the time, I didn't believe I had a chance. I didn't know if I was going to make it or not, but I knew I wasn't going to blow my chances by screwing up.
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