BOSTON BRUINS QUOTES MEDIA DAY PRESS CONFERENCE Tuesday, October 1, 2019 BOSTON BRUINS CHAIRMAN JEREMY JACOBS, CEO CHARLIE JACOBS, PRESIDENT CAM NEELY, GENERAL MANAGER DON SWEENEY AND HEAD COACH BRUCE CASSIDY On his thoughts on training camp… DS: Well, obviously, we’d like to be 100 percent healthy. Joakim Nordstrom is not going to start with us – an injury we’ve been looking at, been working his way back in. And obviously, Krech [David Krejci] is still working his way back. We started with no [Kevan] Miller and [John] Moore, and then he got hurt, so that’s one of the primary concerns in the organization where we’re going to be health-wise. Next man up in those situations. Bruce and the team’s done a really good job. Overall, I thought our game was really good. We executed in games; we had different lineups; we had a lot of opportunity for younger players to see what they would do. We certainly managed the minutes of the players that had gone deep in the playoffs with us, and that was by design. I think that if you look at the practices, we ask the guys to show up and work every day and do things they want to do and accomplish, and I think it was designed and set up that way, and I think it was executed that way. On David Krejci’s status to start the season… DS: You know, it’s to be determined still. He worked his way back out there for practice, and hopefully he’ll continue to do the same, so we’ll evaluate him every day. He’s a possible. On the changes to TD Garden… CJ: Yeah, I’ll tell you what. It is vastly different. We, when I say we, a number of us up here, took a tour this morning to gauge where we’re going to be in terms of opening day on the 12th. There’s a lot of work to still be done, but it is transformational. Our aspirations when we began the project was to have the best in-arena experience in North America for our eventgoers, and hopefully the feedback will reflect that when we achieve it. As for the journey, this has taken a long time, and I think probably my father here could tell you more about the navigation of the different political circles and perhaps the red tape and bureaucracy that we had to get through in order to see this project to fruition. But, again, all through it, it really is going to be transformational for not only TD Garden, but I think the West End community and the North End community. On if there is more on his slate moving forward… CJ: I think my father could probably answer this a lot more accurately than I can, but I believe he had a vision long ago about trying to keep our family business just that, a family business, and continue with myself and my siblings in professional management roles. This has been a journey; this has been a long time. I do have two siblings that work out of our corporate headquarters in Buffalo. I spend a day a week in Buffalo and have for many years. I work Mondays out of there, and I come and start my work week here on Tuesdays. But as for a decision-making process, most of our decisions are collaborative, unless of course our chairman has a thought, and of course we do what he tells us to do. On if he is now trying to learn more about the player and hockey side of things… CJ: Well, you know I’ve been working in the National Hockey League in some capacity since 1994 so I guess this will be about 25 years I’ve been – I don’t feel like I’m a newbie when it comes to hockey operations and club personnel decisions, although I try to empower the people here to my right to make those decisions. On the culture that has been established in Boston… CJ: It’s funny that you bring this up, because we were walking through Warrior today, and this was after we just toured the TD Garden and all of those renovations, and I looked at Cam [Neely], and I said, ‘Do you remember the days we were in Wilmington and what it was like there on media day?’ It is a total game changer when you think about the Boston Bruins and what it is like to come play for us, in terms of the environment, the collaboration we have with the different subsidiaries that are operating here under Delaware North, including the Bruins. I think this is a destination. I like to think this is a destination for a lot of our players, and the pride of the jersey that they have in front. That’s what I think, but I think the players themselves would probably best answer that question. On this season potentially being affected by the long playoff run… BC: Well, I don’t think there’s a blueprint out there on moving on, including the Patriots. Do the right thing a couple of years ago, they lost and got back and won last year. So right now we’re back here. Typically, the hockey teams have not gone to the final. It’s been a long time, Detroit and Montreal years ago. Even Pittsburgh repeating, it’s a tough thing to do, so some of it will be dependent on the roles of the players, and like they said earlier, we try to manage our training camp. We started with that and see where it goes from there, because things change quickly. So, for us, it’s about how we manage minutes of our players who have been through a lot of these runs. Secondly, we’ve communicated with the players that have been through these, the Bergerons, the Charas that went through it in ’13 and came back the next year and had a great regular season. They didn’t achieve what they wanted in the playoffs; I don’t know if that had anything to do with going to the Cup the year before. Sometimes it’s just hard to repeat, so I think you’ve got to be careful how much you’re reading into that and rely on what the players are telling you and what their bodies are telling. On if depth is even more important due to the long season last year… DS: Well, I think I’ll correct you in the sense that the teams in the past – we actually did a study that teams in the past four or five years have actually done very well in the regular season…so it’s certainly part of what we looked at. When it comes down to it on a little more of a day to day, you know your team is going to hit a wall at some point in time based on the mileage from the previous season. We have to find those pockets of the schedule, maybe utilize the break effectively which didn’t happen in the past and allow them to recharge. We’ve had some open dialogue about it, but history says the team generally gets off and a healthy part of that gets off to a good start. Mentally and physically, these guys are ready to go. It’s just a matter of getting into the grind and if you can stay healthy. And obviously, we proved last year with 37 players in our lineup, you need that. To be successful, you have to have it, and you run in to challenging parts of the schedule, you’re going to go through injuries, and you have to have other players come in and be able to step up, and that will be no different for us this year. On signing depth players in free agency rather than filling spots within the organization… DS: Well, I’m still eager to see our young kids develop and take jobs. It hasn’t been for a lack of opportunity that have been provided. I think we said that when we tried our new course that we were going to draft and develop and allow players to take advantage of opportunity, and I think that’s locked with Bruce’s philosophy in terms of if the player’s capable of playing and helping us. You can pick a player. Karson Kuhlman is an example, coming as a college free agent. There was an opportunity and culture here that allowed him to come in and be comfortable and to step in and play. He played in front of other players and it was successful. I don’t think that’s ever going to go away; we want a competitive environment. Every day you walk through the door, we want a competitive environment, and I’ll share two examples that we felt in specific cases for Lindholm being a penalty killer and a left-shot center. We were deficient in that area at the time. We lost Sean Kuraly last time for a period of time, killing penalties, taking draws. We talked about being on the inside of the ice and playing against teams with heavy defense, and [Brett] Ritchie’s improving, but he’s proving he can play in there. Now if he can stay there and occupy that spot on the roster and contribute, that’s to be determined. If not, which is the message we sent to Anders Bjork, was you’ll get that opportunity, just like you did a couple of years ago riding shotgun in a pretty good spot.