After waiting all week, Vancouver Canucks head coach Travis Green finally made his NHL debut Saturday night in a 3-2 win over the Edmonton Oilers.
Green rode sensational play from Bo Horvat to victory as the 22-year-old scored twice in 18:37 of ice time.
After the game, Green joined Scott Oake and Louie DeBrusk for an interview on After Hours, praising the Canucks’ effort despite having to wait so long to finally get on the ice.
“I’m proud of our guys. We’ve had a hard training camp and a bit of a longer camp with the trip to China, obviously the delay with our first [game of the season]. I thought we were a little rusty to start but I’m really proud of the team for the way they played tonight for 60 minutes.”
Green would go on to touch on a number of topics with Oake and DeBrusk. Here are some of the highlights, including why he decided to scratch Brock Boeser.
On the play of Horvat
“First of all he’s coming back from an injury. To get two goals in a game like this is huge, he got the power-play goal and then the strong, gritty goal around the net, it kind of describes how he’s going to play. He’s a 200-foot player and he’s going to be able to score in many different ways and he did tonight.”
On the differences of coaching at the NHL level
“Every level you go up I find there’s little nuances that are different. Coaching, for starters, is a lot different in terms of line matching, and trying to anticipate who’s going on the ice. But you’re still just coaching. I haven’t tried to overthink it, and hopefully take it a step at a time.”
On his decision to sit Boeser
“There’s been a lot of hype on Brock. There’s a lot of big expectations on him. It’s twofold, really. I’m thinking about the team and I’m thinking about development and Brock. I felt for the game against Edmonton, we needed to have a couple lines that were going to be effective against the McDavid line and he just happened to be the guy out. There’s 82 games in the season, it’s a long season still. He’s going to get plenty of opportunities to play. I’ve had a good conversation with Brock and I’m not worried about it at all.”
On winning an award in Pat Quinn’s name
“It was a huge honour. I’ve had the opportunity to play for a lot of coaches over the years and Pat was a great coach, we all know that. He was a fantastic individual, but the special thing about Pat was as great a coach as he was, he was an amazing person off the ice. You always knew he had your back, he wanted the best for his players, and that’s something I’ll never forget and it’s an award that really means something to me.”
On distinguishing the Sedins in street clothes
“I can occasionally. They catch me off guard once in a while. Hank didn’t practice the other day and Daniel came into my office and it took me a little while to make sure it was Daniel, but I’m starting to learn them apart.”
Listen to the full interview in the video player at the top of this page.
[relatedlinks]
