“I just think there’s more there,” Quinn said. “He and I talked about it [Saturday]. He’s a really good player, we just need him to play to his ability.” about Spooner
“[Pionk] does a great job getting the puck through to the net,” Quinn said. “He doesn’t try to make the difficult pass, he’s making the right pass. He’s not overthinking it. It’s amazing what happens — you just keep making the right play, the opportunities are going to present themselves.”
“He’s just such an honest player,” Quinn said. “He’s so coachable. He’s got good skills. Such a likable guy that, forget the fact he’s a good hockey player, he just brings an energy to the line.” about Fast
“As long as he continues to put forth an effort, we’re going to let him play because we think very highly of him,” Quinn said. “He’s a big piece of our future and I think he could be good right now. This isn’t just about the future, this is about us winning hockey games right now and we think he can help us.” about Chytil
“I just think he just feels good about himself,” the coach said. “One of the things when we talked this summer, we both wanted to erase what happened last year. We were picking up where he left off the previous year against [Ottawa] in the playoffs when he was so good. Pick up where he put himself in a position for us to sign him long term and trade for him and be a good player in this league.
“We’re not asking guys to do something they haven’t done before. I think he’s back to being the effective, good defenseman that he’s been for a while.” about Smith
“I was going to come back with Cody, but I decided to get Butchie back in,” Quinn, who has not yet gone with the same lineup in consecutive games, said before the match. “I’ve said before that a lot of these decisions are not 100 percent, they are 51-49 a lot. But Butchie is going to be an important part of what we’re going to do.
“Listen, he’s a really good player, he had a good practice [on Monday] and he’s got a good attitude. We need him. I want to get him back on the horse.”
“Freddy makes good passes, and he’s brought energy to our game,” Quinn said. “He’s given us what we need. With eight defensemen, I’ve told them all, ‘If you want to play, grab a position.’ ”
“This guy is a talented player,” Quinn said. “I think what he and I have talked about is we just need more out of him consistently. He’s got an awful lot of talent and skill, but that’s not going to get you a lot of production offensively if you don’t do the other things you need to do offensively. It’s not just him, it’s our team in general. “We have to have more of a grit element to our game offensively, we have to get to the net, there has to be less BS to our game offensively. We have to have more of a shooters’ mentality. He and I talked about that. I think it’ll good for him to sit and watch. Again, he’s a guy that has an awful lot of talent and skill, but there’s more to this game than that.” about Buch
“This is a guy who’s coming off major knee surgery, who is getting his game back, who’s physically getting there and mentally getting there,” the coach said. “To expect him to come back and hit the ground running might have been a little premature.
“Pionk is going to play a lot of hockey for us,” Quinn said. “He and I have talked. I don’t want to reveal our lineup for our next game, but he’s a guy I like an awful lot, and he’s going to play a lot for us.”
“Tony knows what he needs to do,” first-year coach David Quinn said before the game. “We’ve had good conversations, and he knows what’s expected of him. He knows what he needs to do to get back in the lineup.”
