He's an excellent stick-handler. One of the best skaters and shooters I've ever had.

I thought we'd have a good year. We were right at .500 last year on the season, and we got a pretty good crop of (newcomers).

He figures he knows the Murdoch system and nothing would give him greater pleasure than beating his old coach. Nothing would give the old coach a better feeling than to send him home with a couple of lessons on working harder.

Championship teams win playing defense. We're getting scoring from four different lines, so (opponents) can't shadow any one line. And the third thing that's a key is goaltending. Our goaltending has been outstanding.

I started out trying to mix it up, having some veterans and some rookies on four different lines for the learning aspect. Now it's settled in. I want a very aggressive goal-scorer to be with a good passer with a very good checker. Those combinations are working out good. The opponent is not able to shadow any one line with all our players on it.