Murray, on team defense

By Rich Hammond on October 8, 2008 4:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) |

Since his hiring, Murray has been stressing the importance of improved defense. Here's what he said today regarding the Kings' progress on defense during training camp...

Question: Are you happy with what you've seen defensively, in terms of the grit?

MURRAY: ``Defensively, it's been moving along pretty good. I think there's a good buy-in by everybody. Coming into training camp, we talked as a camp about what our focus was going to be. When you look at the numbers from last year, the goals against and the quality chances against, it's not a tough sell. The players want to be responsible, they want to do a good job and they know that there can be some dramatic improvement on your hockey club if you really shut down on the defensive side of things. So, we want to get there and we want to do it right, and I like what I've seen so far on the defensive side.''

1 Comments

JonG

said:

Translation: we've got a ways to go yet, but the players seem receptive. Ask me again in December.

October 8, 2008 9:38 PM

J.P. Hoornstra writes about NHL and IHL hockey for the Los Angeles Newspaper Group. He welcomes any and all dialogue on the finer points of hockey. E-mail J.P. at jp.hoornstra
@inlandnewspapers.com.

Jill Painter joined the Daily News in 2000 and during the last eight years she's covered the Dodgers, Cal State Northridge, UCLA, Kings, golf and everything in between. Even though she's from Colorado, she still freezes in the Staples Center press box but always manages to thaw her fingers in time to make deadline. E-mail Jill at jill.painter@dailynews
.com.