Tage Thompson After Practice Interview (12/29/2023)

Tage Thompson After Practice Interview (12/29/2023)

So how much of a change will that be having Owen quarterbacking your power play um I mean they’re both obviously very gifted players think they game extremely well and obviously they’re both drafted first overall for a reason so um I think they’re you know we got

One of the uh the advantages of having that luxury of two guys that can run a first unit and um I think obviously haven’t been getting the results we wanted so I think it’s just something to try to change it up see if something else clicks you guys have practiced it a

Lot and Donnie you know I noticed he was talking a lot to you guys when he came to the bench uh what kind of things have you been working on to make this thing better I think uh just being a little more simple a little more direct um I

Think maybe we gotten into a little bit of trouble trying to force things uh through sticks cross eyes um I think just trying to keep a simple attack and recover pucks and um make the PK work how difficult is it when you know the other team is going to shade to you a

Lot on the one time or you guys need some other options too other guys willing willing to shoot yeah I think you know we just you shoot and recover pucks he gets the PK running around they’re less likely to be able to just sit on on one person and um I think you

Got to move the puck quick let the puck do the work get them you know out and back um Tire them out and then that’s when the seams will open up and uh you’ll get some good scoring chances so I think like I said just simplifying it

And probably a little more shot volume I know how competitive you are how much do you use the last game against Columbus as motivation that hey you know we owe them type of a type of a thing plus you’ve had two good the team has had two

Good days of practice here getting ready for it yeah I think everyone in here knows uh the way last game went and um it’s just not acceptable and I think obviously we had a good response uh the following game um I think that’s something going into this game we’re

Going to you know have in the back of our minds and um we’re going to have to come out come out strong and um I I’ve said before words words are you know everyone says the right things it’s it’s about doing them so um everyone’s just

Got to be ready to go HCK drop how we’ve talked about this a lot with players with Don just how difficult is it the way you guys have struggled at home really for the better part of a year now one of the lowest home records in the

League and it it’s damaged your you know your playoff hopes in both seasons how do you get out of that rut in this building uh I think probably by just not really listening to comments like that thing you just kind of block it out you know what what’s

Happened is happened and you can’t change the past right so um the only thing we can focus on is is what we have moving forward and I think a lot of times when when you do that you kind of bite off more than you can chew at

Sometimes and I think for us it’s just keeping it simple keeping it um you know very very short um you know as far as the goals we set for ourselves in the future just one game at a time focused on that next game um don’t put too much

Weight into to you know the schedule or who’s coming up um so for us in this room right now doesn’t matter what’s happened up to this point um it’s a long season a lot can happen and obviously last season’s done so that doesn’t even matter um so we got a game against

Columbus it’s all we’re focusing on be ready for that game and then whatever happens after that then we start focusing on on that moving forward how much does the first goal get magnified especially here you know crowd the crowd gets a little more restless and it’s not

Like when you’re on the road when you get down you can pop back in and guys get a little tighter maybe yeah I think scoring first whether you’re at home or away is very important in the game you know gets the other team back on their heels and we’ve been on

The other end of it and it’s it’s very tough chasing games and obviously when you’re chasing it in your home building and and the fans are against you it’s even even tougher so um getting that first goal getting the crowd into it is something that’s important for us and

Getting that momentum um is something that that’s huge and obviously we played a lot of our our best games when when we get that first goal so um that goes back to getting a good start and um I think that’s all just mentally being ready when the puck drops what you were just

Talking about is it hard to do to just live in today and not look ahead to oh we have three games this week against so and so and so and so is that a difficult thing to do just to live in today only yeah I think when things are going well

For you it’s easy to to stay in the moment but I think that’s that’s tough when you’re when you’re going through adversity and challenges and kind of the way our season’s been going it that’s when it’s a little you know tougher to focus on the now um that’s kind of when

You start to look into the future and try to plan out the season and plan out what you need to do to to get to a certain spot uh down the road like I said I think that end goal is obviously making playoffs and having a good push

And I think everyone in the room knows that that doesn’t change so looking down that road um you know is kind of is kind of pointless for us at this point I think for us it’s we’re not going to get there unless we play good against Columbus tomorrow right so that it

Starts with that game and then you do your job that night and then now you focus on a new job job and that’s playing Ottawa so like like I said we’re not even thinking of Ottawa right now we’re thinking of Columbus and um to be honest with you I don’t even really know

Our schedule past you know uh two or three games so um kind of fortunate that way but that’s got to be a mindset for everyone in here that that we have one game and that’s that’s all we’re focus on and then moving forward that’s got to be the mindset the whole season

Tage Thompson After Practice Interview (12/29/2023)

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