How did your coaching career start?
It really started when I was a high school teacher. My inclination for the sub- ject area was based on a lot of activity that I had during my university days when I worked at various hockey schools. Even prior to that I ran high school skating pro- grams in Whitby, Ontario. After obtaining my undergraduate degree in Physical Education, I went to the University of Toronto to get my teaching certification.
While I was a teacher at Don Mills Collegiate in Toronto, my first assignment was coaching men’s lacrosse. We had a very successful run, and really, that’s what started to pique my interest in coaching. I also coached female swimming, boys’ basketball, and hockey at Forest Hill.
At the same time I was player/coach of the Whitby Senior A hockey team, an interesting combination. I really enjoyed the coaching, so I dropped playing and then went on to coach Junior B in Oshawa while still coaching high school hockey. Next I left teaching to coach the Peterborough Petes, and the following year Scotty Bowman offered me a job in the American Hockey League. I coached there for three years and then returned to the University of Toronto Hockey Club, where I had played as a grad student. After that I was hired to coach in the National Hockey League.
Did you have a background in swimming and basketball, or did you just pick them up?
I played lacrosse as a youngster in Whitby, which is a lacrosse hotbed, much like Vancouver. Swimming was just something that I picked up. I wanted to help the kids, and the swim team coach couldn’t make the commitment, so I offered to coach since it was in the fall when I wasn’t quite into the hockey program yet. I now integrate a lot of different coaching and teaching techniques from the various sports I have coached. I was also able to integrate some of the strategies that we used between the different sports. The energy systems used in basketball, anaer- obic and aerobic, are quite like hockey. Interval training is an important part of hockey, and with lacrosse there is a big carry-over of hand-eye co-ordination to hockey. I experimented a lot too. I moved from one sport to another, and it was quite interesting to see different things evolve in my coaching philosophy and tech- niques as a result of having a base of different sports to coach. I have found that many coaching principles move sideways across sports. They are fundamentally the same. The application of strategy and tactics are unique to each sport, but the principles about coaching lie within all.
What motivates you?
I love the game of hockey. I’ve always loved the game. When I played at var- ious levels it was never in my mind that I would continue to be involved in the game as a coach. That evolved through time, primarily as a result of my teaching background, which was certainly something that I enjoyed. I enjoyed coaching and I enjoyed teaching. Coaching in high school really perked my interest. I had some success at various levels, and that gave me the confidence that maybe I could coach in the NHL at a top level. It motivates me now to see youngsters share some of the experiences that I’ve had of winning and the teaching process and being in- volved in the game. It’s highly motivating for me to try to strive to be amongst the best in this industry and to see if I can touch people in a certain way and have them share the same vision and the same motivation that I have.
Do you believe it’s an NHL coach’s job to motivate a player and keep him at the peak level, or is it the player’s job?
I think it’s the responsibility of both people. The coach has to provide an envi- ronment, a basis from which to work, and knowledge to help the athlete ascertain his best skill set to develop his best level of performance. That varies from the youngsters to the most experienced players. I’ve coached athletes from both sides of the spectrum, and I think it’s the athlete’s ultimate responsibility to learn how to professionally perform at his peak every night. I also think the teacher, the coach, has a responsibility to that individual to inspire, care for, and provide a sense of direction for them individually and as a group, because it is a team game.
In your opinion, does the fear of losing motivate more than the enjoyment of win- ning?
I understand the question and I understand both motivational aspects. I think when I came into the league the idea of losing was very motivating for me. The fear of losing was something that drove me and made me work that much more dili- gently at what I was trying to provide for the athlete. I think through some of the experiences I’ve had with some of the top performers in the NHL I learned to enjoy the winning aspect of it as well. You can enjoy the fruits of your labour. You don’t always have to be on the edge of preparing for the next competition; you can let yourself go a little bit and enjoy those aspects. I would say that the thing that’s most motivating for me right now wouldn’t fall under either category, and that’s the motivation of the teaching aspect as opposed to the fear of failure or the pleasure of success. I enjoy winning, obviously, more than losing, but I understand the losing process. It is important to develop the foundation for a winning program and get people to understand how that works, as well as getting them to value competition. To thrive on it, to enjoy it, without the fear of losing, and at the same time enjoy some of the aspects that they can be proud of and that they’ve accomplished, that’s the joy of winning.
Can a coach instill confidence in a player? Do you concern yourself with players’ self-talk or body language?
You can definitely instill confidence in an athlete. They look for leaders, role models, and support. Most athletes don’t mind being challenged. They don’t mind being asked to do something that they might be a bit fearful of. You have the vi- sion, as their mentor, of what they might be able to accomplish. Sometimes they can’t see it or they have fear that they may not be able to achieve a certain perfor- mance level. You can definitely inspire and provide confidence by integrating the aspects of challenging and supporting an athlete at the same time. That comes in various ways between ice time distribution or skill development or helping them sort out some of the mental skills that they need in order to be better.
I am definitely concerned with the behaviour of an individual and how he por- trays himself. I like to see people feel good about themselves. You can challenge — that’s part of the coaching profession — but you have to give the support they need to make them feel good about themselves and give them the preparation process for developing confidence in their teammates, their team game, their skills, and their own individual ability. Give them responsible opportunities to grow, put them in situations from which they begin to get some success, give individuals challenges, and give them assignments that enable them to achieve some level of success. Putting them in situations that they’re not ready for can make it difficult for them to develop their own self-confidence. An example of that would be putting a rookie forward into a penalty-killing situation to start the season, as opposed to maybe letting them watch a couple of veteran players do the job. It’s better to ex- plain and talk to them as the season progresses, and then give them a little bit at a time until they feel comfortable.
Can you read a player’s ability or willingness to perform when you look in his eyes or at his body language?
I’d say yes, just from my own experience and having been around athletes for such a long time. I think that’s part of your bench management strength. Another part of my strength is my ability to read the game as it’s unfolding. It’s unrealistic to think that from Game 1 through Game 82 of the schedule every athlete is going to be at his very best every night. You’ve got 20 people dressed, and some are going to be on the up-cycle of their confidence levels, physical levels, or how they’re feeling about their family or personal problems or themselves, their health, their teammates, their role, or who they’re playing against. These are the dynamics of the game.
That’s another thing that I love: the dynamics of the game. People can be asked how many minutes are in a hockey game, and the normal answer is 60. Actually there are 720. There are 360 minutes in regulation time distributed between two teams that have 20 players each, so if you give 60 minutes to your goalie (most teams will laugh when I tell them this and say, “You never do that,” because I am always pulling my goaltender) then you’ve got 300 minutes to distribute on your side with no penalties. The other coach has the same. How you manage this time and who you give it to at what time is an art, and you must be able to read the game and your players as it is unfolding.
Do you like to change everybody, or do you have one of your assistant coaches do that?
I change all players. Some people don’t, but maybe it’s an old habit of mine.
I know you’ve had some great players develop under you. Can you identify players that you challenged to be better?
I’ve had a lot of good luck in that regard. The first person who comes to mind is Pelle Lindbergh, who was playing in the minors when I arrived in Philadelphia. I gave him a chance to be the number one goaltender, and he won the Vezina Tro- phy and the President’s Trophy because of it. I coached a lot of great young players during my career in Philadelphia. We had four rookies and the youngest team in pro sport. Our best player, Mark Howe, struggled with his confidence at first and then became a superior player in the league. He and his partner, Brad McCrimmon, were plus 52 or 55 one year.
There were a lot of good young players who worked their way through various scenarios, like Jeremy Roenick in Chicago or Ron Hextall back in Philadelphia, both youngsters coming out of the American League, or Ed Belfour coming out of the Canadian national program. Some people were established; some, like Michel Goulet, needed to be jump-started; and others needed a change of venue, like Chris Chelios. Steve Larmer was taught to pay more attention to his personal fit- ness so he could play at a higher level. A lot of people in St. Louis were wondering about Chris Pronger and Pavel Demitra. Chris didn’t have much direction and wasn’t trained. Grant Fuhr was a goaltender that everyone had given up on, but he was a Hall of Famer as far as I was concerned.
Do you have a vision for the player, or is it an evaluation process that convinces you a player hasn’t achieved his potential?
I’m a firm believer in giving people a second or third or fourth opportunity to discover themselves. I think in a lot of these cases, if you look at them and examine them, these are young people who are put in a pressured situation, and sometimes they are very immature or just not ready. For example, Olli Jokinen couldn’t speak much English when he was picked third overall. He arrived in Los Angeles from Finland at 18 years old and probably hadn’t spent any time thinking about or pre- paring himself to be a professional. Organizations proclaim that players like he and Joe Thornton in Boston will be the immediate saviours. Then the media gets hold of this and blows it out of proportion. It’s just too much to ask of people like that. There was disapproval of Jokinen in Los Angeles, in Long Island, and in Florida. I sat down with him and said, “We’re going to find out, once and for all: Were all the scouts in the world wrong, or should we just adjust the program here for you? You’re going to have to train harder. You’re going to have to pay attention to what you’re doing,” and so forth. I think when he was challenged he felt there was an element of fairness and he also felt that there was an opportunity. I think he had squandered it a little bit by his own accord, and part of his maturation was accept- ing that. He still had an opportunity ahead of him, but the window of opportunity was going to close if he didn’t take advantage.
There is an adage that I often use, which comes from my own background: A good teacher is a good teacher when the student is prepared to learn. That is a big plus, but you also have to be inspiring enough as an individual or as a teacher to set a challenge in front of them and give them the support needed because there’s going to be a great deal of fear. They’ve been told for so long that they aren’t capa- ble of doing something. If they’re on the ice but don’t get feedback or support from their environment, they do fail. You’ve got to provide both at the same time.
Do you ever get a player who goes halfway and you can’t get him the rest of the way? If that happens, do you trade him?
Not necessarily. I’ll do whatever is best for the team. If that player provides something that the team needs, then that’s good enough. It’s not just the coach who can get the other half, but also the dynamics of the group. You have to have sub-group leaders, and they don’t always have to be your best players; they can be your best role players. There’s a place for everyone in this culture.
How do you help individual players who are experiencing adversity, and how do you deal with team adversity?
With team adversity you have to try to educate them and build, if you can, a level of preparation for them to know what might be coming. For example, with a young group as you gain a little recognition, other teams are going to respect you and they are going to be more prepared for you. Then you know your effort is going to have to be greater as well. As teams gain a higher level of respect for you they are going to be more competitive against you, so there is a level of adversity you walk your team through, and they build a trust amongst themselves. You reinforce it and teach them. You teach them systems. You teach them what they can rely on, knowing that every level of success is enriched with some level of adversity. What you are going through is of assistance, not a detriment. You’re learning from it. You’re learning how to deal with certain situations you felt would be very difficult for you as an individual and as a team.
The same thing applies to an individual. You see yourself in an adverse situ- ation now, but there’s an opportunity there for you if you look hard enough. There’s a window there, something to be found that’s positive. You’re learning something about yourself. How can you walk through this life and find another venue or av- enue or street to walk on that you can benefit from? You’re going to find the journey from the start is not a straight line. It has its ups and downs going through all the demands and dynamics of what this league provides over a course of 180 days to get to the playoffs. It’s not a straight line. It doesn’t go straight down, and it doesn’t go straight up. It fluctuates depending on where you are, and you will learn through difficult times as well as good times. You’re never as good as you think you are, and you are never as poor as you think you are. There’s always something there to be found that would be positive in any situation.
Do you have these talks with players individually? Are you a philosopher coach?
I don’t know if I’m a philosopher, but I work to build a philosophy that I be- lieve, and talk about it and try to share it and help them understand it and give them vivid examples of what I’m talking about.
What types of players are the most challenging for you to coach?
The players who are most challenging are the ones who don’t completely sub- scribe to team skills and the ones who are more interested in their own needs than the team’s needs. That is part of what the culture of the game provides, and each team has some members like that, but that’s the challenge. The hardest earned re- spect comes from the individual that you had to work hardest with to achieve the desired result. In the end he is the most revered because it was so difficult for you to get that player to a certain point. Once they get there then they’re solid because you had to work so hard on your relationship with them to get them to that point, and if you can do that, then they really believe in you.
Is it a fine line between selfishness and confidence?
Sometimes it’s viewed as being selfish, and sometimes it’s total insecurity. You’ve got to read that. Most people in this game are great, so I often give them the benefit of the doubt that they’re doing it just to preserve their own ego or their own self-esteem or they’re in a situation where they’ve been rejected. You then need to build their trust in you. They’re the hardest ones to earn that trust from, but once you do they are pretty grounded with you.
Is there credibility to a big motivational speech, the locker-room soapbox speech, prior to a game?
There is, and it’s timely; it doesn’t have to be every day. You speak to your team as a group three or four times a night during the NHL season, so it certainly can’t be done all the time, but I think there is a time and place for it. You have to rely on your own experience as a coach and your instincts to tell you what that message has to be at that particular time and when you should deliver it.
Is it a gut feel?
I think it is really from your own experience. After you have coached a number of years you know when it’s time to challenge your team or support them. You have to know their development as a group and as individuals to know who you’re deal- ing with, what you’re dealing with, and what the circumstances are. You have to understand the cadence of your team in terms of scheduling and in terms of suc- cess all year, in terms of health, in terms of the environment they are dealing with, whether you’re on the road or at home, what the expectation levels were for the group to begin a season as well as present expectation levels which change during the course of the year. Whether you come from an underdog to a contender or to a failure, those are all different levels of achievement and development, and each of these demand different responses from a coach.
Do you and your coaching staff try to find an angle every night?
You try to find some aspect of their development as a group to give them a rea- son to reach another level, to inspire them to be better, to build a crescendo from the beginning of the season to the end. You ask them to strive to be a little bit bet- ter than they have been in certain areas. Sometimes these are very specific areas and sometimes more general. This may be done in small groups, sometimes indi- vidually, sometimes in larger groups, and sometimes with the entire team. Again, it comes in different forms. It doesn’t always have to be the same, but you have to know as a coach what it will look like and what it means to the athlete. Another thing I often tell myself or try to explain to those I coach with is it’s better to under- stand than be understood. I have to understand them and they have to understand me, but it’s especially important that you understand where they are.
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