Rob Blake
Rob Blake
Robert Bowlby Blakeis a Canadian retired professional ice hockey player and the current assistant general manager of the Los Angeles Kings of the National Hockey League. He was originally drafted by the Kings in 1988, appearing in the 1993 Stanley Cup Finals, winning the James Norris Memorial Trophy and serving as team captain for five seasons in his initial 11-season stint with the club. In 2001, Blake was traded to the Colorado Avalanche and helped the team win their second...
ProfessionHockey Player
Date of Birth10 December 1969
CitySimcoe, Canada
It wasn't about the Stanley Cup the year before, it was all about the gold medal. That's been the talk the last three years, and now this year. When you go home in the summers, the gold medal is remembered more. The difference now is defending the gold medal.
They're a very veteran team. They understand they've been in the last two games. A bounce here or there and the games could have been different. Knowing that they have got guys that have been around a long time, had guys that have won Cups and guys with a lot of leadership, that's why we expect their best game.
We had a quick one early on but the second one was a major one, it lasted a minute. The big difference in their 5-on-3? They made the play.
I think the last 25, 30 games, we've been battling to find our way into the playoffs, and once we succeeded, I think the emotion was tough to bring. But now we move on against Dallas, and I think you'll see we won't have trouble bringing emotion.
We finally had to battle to win a game. I think we've been getting away with just outscoring teams and it's kind of caught us the last two weeks. We haven't been working nearly hard enough to win games.
The last month of the season did help us prepare for the playoffs. But, the guys still have to understand what's at stake in the playoffs and that the intensity will go up even higher.
It's nice we only see him once a year during the regular season. He's a great player and he's done tremendous things for the Colorado Avalanche franchise over the years. We were excited about going in and seeing him. He's a big part of the Avalanche history and always will be.
I've got to start getting the puck to the net a little more, ... I usually have more shots than I do right now (14), that's for sure. I can pick that up, jump in the play a little more. I think I'm lacking a little offensively.
Not good. It's not the outcome any of us wanted by any means.
It's a new season for him, and he knows he can be the difference in the series.
It's always the same. Yeah, we got the first gold medal in 50 years or something like that. But the pressure to win and the expectations to win will always be there.
That second period, as much time as we spent in our own zone, it was tough to generate things.
It was just a scramble. I took a couple shots that got blocked and Andrew (Brunette) made a play out front just to kind of whack the puck there. I was fortunate it went in.
We expect (Dallas) to come out and play hard Friday.