Ilya Kovalchuk: "Special teams are key in the playoffs"

- Are you happy to have finished this series in four matches?

- I am more happy that my mother is celebrating her birthday. I want to wish her a happy birthday and to say that I love her very much. This victory is for her.

- Taking into account the entire series, did everything turn out as expected?

- The first game in the series was the most difficult, but after that, maybe we were a bit lucky or played better than Vityaz. Thanks to Vityaz for this series, they had a good season and achieved what they wanted to. We move on.

- SKA scored 23 goals in this series. Does this speak about the fact that SKA have a strong attack or that Vityaz are weak defensively?

- Our powerplay worked well. We will continue improving our special teams, they are key in the playoffs.

- Would it have been more difficult against Jokerit?

- This is already history. In Novogorsk, we trained hard. At the end of April, we will see if it was good that we didn't play against Jokerit .

- Will eight days rest make it tougher for you?

- No, it's good that that we can heal our bruises which we have and prepare for the next round.

- Are you following other series?

- Yes, we are watching how other teams are playing.

- Which opponent would you like to play next?

- It doesn't matter, we will start at home anyway.

- Which results in other series have surprised you?

- Right now, we are mainly thinking about our own matches. Today we managed to finish the series, we have a few days to recuperate and be with our families.

- In the first half of today's game, you made more passes than shots.

- I thought that my teammates were in better shooting positions. Evgeny Ketov is playing really well, I wanted him to feel the puck and score. Evgeny deserves a lot of respect for the way he is playing.

- Has he settled into your line?

- Yes, I think that we performed well. We only conceded one goal in the first match when playing four on four.