'Feeling confident and having fun': Knoblauch on Game 4 win, going on the road again and Kane's status

Edmonton Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch talked to reporters Sunday morning after his team's impressive 8-1 win over the Florida Panthers in Game 4 at Rogers Place Saturday night.

Edmonton Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch talked to reporters Sunday morning after his team's impressive 8-1 win over the Florida Panthers in Game 4 at Rogers Place Saturday night.

The Panthers lead the Stanley Cup Final 3-1 as the series shifts back to South Florida Tuesday night.

Here's what Knoblauch said on Sunday.

Question: Before the game you talked about the fact that you're probably going to need some 'puck luck' if you're to turn this thing around and hopefully win a game. And I think you got that and then some in yesterday's game, even with the first goal when the Panthers hit the post twice in one second and it comes down the ice and Janmark scores. My question is, I guess how do you reconcile the fact that in addition to doing everything right and doing all this tremendous work in preparing and getting ready physically, mentally, there's also this one magic component that you have no control over but you need it to happen every single time going forward.

Knoblauch: There's been times when we played near-perfect games, as good as Game 1, I thought that was a pretty good effort by our guys. And even when you do that, things don't work out the way you feel it should. And all we can control is how we play. We can't control the calls the referee makes or how the goalie on the other side plays or how the team does or the opposition does. So we just have to control what we can control. We're going to try and play our best hockey that we can and hopefully that's enough to win us three more games.

Question: Last night Paul Maurice said he does not believe in momentum. I'm curious if you do, and if so, how much do you guys feel you have going into Game 5?

Knoblauch: I believe in momentum and that it lasts about shift to shift. Other than that from game to game, period to period, I don't think that it does. I think our team, obviously after a game like that they feel good about themselves. They're feeling confident. But I think even when we were down three games to zero, our team felt confident about how they can play so I think it's important during the game that say line one has a strong shift, spends a lot of time in the offensive zone, I think I believe in that momentum. It helps build lines two or three after them just able to sustain that pressure. But things change very quickly.