Dallas Eakins thanks Lars Eller for pregame bulletin board material

Dallas Eakins was thankful for Lars Eller's pregame comments that compared the Oilers to "a junior team."

By Adam Gretz Oct 22, 2013, 11:58pm EDT

Before the Oilers faced the Canadiens on Tuesday night, Montreal forward Lars Eller had some comments about his team's next opponent.

"It can be anything, you know? They play a little bit like a junior team, I think, sometimes," Eller said, via Chris Stevenson of Canoe.ca. "They take a lot risks, a lot of chances. They’re a little all over the place. There’s not a lot of structure always in their game. It can really be anything. You don’t know."

So. About that.

After falling behind 2-0 in the first period, and playing without Taylor Hall, their best player, the Oilers scored four consecutive goals to rally for a 4-3 win. After the game, Oilers first-year coach Dallas Eakins had some words for Eller.

"It's games like that you don't even really need to go play them," Eakins said. "When you have a player like Lars Eller running his mouth before the game, it makes for great banter in our dressing room, and a great motivation. So we thank Lars Eller for his comments before the game. Awesome."

When asked if bulletin board material is still used in today's game, Eakins said "Absolutely."

"You've got some young player who is trying to get his feet wet calling an organization a junior team, people take notice. I knew it was going to turn. It's just one of those things, it's a total hockey god thing and I'm sure that young man has learned his lesson and I highly doubt you'll ever see anything like that out of his mouth again."

And he wasn't done. Near the end of his media session Eakins finished by adding, "They might as well have sent me over a fruit basket and a bottle of wine. I was like Man, that is just perfect. That was a really great present that Mr. Eller laid on us today."

So, along with eating healthy we'll add bulletin board material and the hockey gods to the list of things that Eakins believes in.

Here is the complete video of Eakins' press conference.