– Captain Steven Stamkos reacted to the loss: “It takes a great team to realize the mistakes that we’ve made. And like I said, I have full confidence in this group, we get back to home ice and we’ll have a much better effort.”
– Stamkos on goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy: “We left them out to dry tonight. He’s been our backbone for years and years and years and we owe it to him to have a better game next game. And I mean, it could have been more. He made some unbelievable saves. So by no means is this on him tonight.”
– This was the first time that Vasilevskiy allowed seven goals in a playoff game. He allowed six three times, including Game 1 against the New York Rangers in the Eastern Conference final.
-Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper on Vasilevskiy: “He’s our guy… he’s the best goalie in the world. We win together, we lose together.
– Stamkos on Tampa’s speed: “It’s certainly the fastest team that we played. So we got to find a way to slow them down. There’s no question, but that’s part of our execution, too, is putting pucks in areas where you can neutralize their speed and not turn the puck over, not giving them freebies, which I thought we did tonight.”
– Cooper on Colorado: “They’re playing at an elite level right now. We are not.”
– Victor Hedman on Tampa’s tough start: “We will figure it out when we get home. You can’t get down, you gotta see it as an opportunity. That’s the bottom line.”
– Andre Burakovsky left the game midway through the second with what appeared to be a hand injury. He did not return for the third period, and Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said he will be further evaluated.
– Darcy Kuemper’s 16-save shutout is the fourth Stanley Cup final shutout in Avalanche playoff history.
– Avalanche defenseman Cale Makar on Darren Helm, who scored on Saturday: “Helmers a beast in general. He works hard on and off the ice … he’s been so good for us all season, playing a key role for us … he’s been incredible in the faceoff dot and everywhere.”
– Makar on preparing for Game 3: “We’re still adapting and learning as a group … you learn from your mistakes and the things you give up in the previous games and move forward … we wanted to keep our momentum and did our best to keep moving forward.”
– Bednar on preparing for Game 3: “We don’t pay attention to the noise outside our locker room when it’s bad and we don’t pay attention when it’s good.”
– Sunday is a travel day, with the two teams heading to Amalie Arena for Monday evening.
