The Lokomotiv Kuban center spoke about what's going on within the team ahead of Game 4 of the semifinal series against CSKA.
- What was your Tuesday training session about?
- We had to rest our bodies. We got one day in between games, so we got to do a lot of recovery. That's what we were doing, just to get our bodies ready to go back to work tomorrow. It's been a long season for everybody. So everybody's body is breaking down a little bit, and you just have to take care of it.
- Are you proud of Vsevolod Ishchenko for receiving the Best Young Player award?
- Oh yeah, I'm so proud of him. It's been a good season for him. I've been tough on him all season. Everybody's been tough on him all season, but he's a great kid. He wants to learn, and he's learning every day. He's going to go off to do big things, and I'm just really proud of him for this award. He worked really hard for it.
- What can we expect of Game 4?
- Just a tough game. We know what we need to do. We just got to go out there and execute it. So it's going to be a tough game. They're the defending champions. They were number one this season. So, of course, it's going to be a tough challenge for us, but I think we can get it done. We just got to play our game.
- Loko already showed that you can handle CSKA. What should you do to start this from the very first seconds of the game?
- We just got to lock in on scouting reports. We got to play more physically, more aggressively than them. We got to outrun them.
- It looks like the level of toughness increases game by game. Do you agree?
- Yeah, it's playoff time now, so every game is going to be physical and very tense. You should like that type of game.
- Can the arena be a good help in Game 4?
- Yeah, anytime anybody shows up, it's supposed to be an inspiration,to give us a little bit of energy. We had a good amount of fans on Monday, it was very good. They never stopped cheering, even when we were down, so we really appreciate that. Hopefully today we play a lot better and get a win.
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