Flyers' new coaching hire is untested at the NHL level
Dave Hakstol comes from the highly successful North Dakota program, but has no playing or coaching experience in the NHL.
/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-pmn.s3.amazonaws.com/public/4YJ2O72JIBCZJEVQIC3HXXQVOQ.jpg)
THE TRACK RECORD of college coaches jumping to the NHL over the last 30 years isn't hard to decipher. It's impossible. NHL teams don't hire college coaches.
The games are so vastly different. The speed, the money, the egos, the travel, the schedule, the scrutiny. It's almost as unheard of as making an offensive-line coach a defensive coordinator.
OK, that's unfair. But the Flyers yesterday pulled their biggest coaching stunner in years by naming Dave Hakstol their new head man. He replaces Craig Berube, who was fired in April after only two seasons. Hakstol is the 19th coach in team history and the 16th guy since the Flyers last won the Stanley Cup in 1975.
Hakstol, 46, was extremely successful as the head coach at the University of North Dakota. He did not win a national championship, but his teams were in contention just about every season. Sounds a little like Chip Kelly, eh?
"There's an old saying that you have to be comfortable being uncomfortable," Hakstol said yesterday in the Hall of Fame room at the Wells Fargo Center. "As I look back at the 11 years at North Dakota, we were always pushing to get better. It's such a competitive atmosphere and the expectations are absolutely high. Now I have the challenge of stepping to the best level in the world with those same expectations, just at the higher level. The challenge of that, the excitement of that is probably the biggest for me."
Married with two children, Hakstol is the first coach to make the leap from college without NHL experience since the Calgary Flames hired Bob Johnson from the University of Wisconsin in 1982. Johnson didn't win a title in Calgary, but he helped lay the foundation for the 1989 championship that came two years after he was gone. The only other coach, again without professional experience, to jump to the NHL was Cornell's Ned Harkness, who was fired by Detroit halfway through his only season (1970-71).
The Flyers hired Mike Keenan from the University of Toronto in 1984, but Keenan had previously won a championship at the AHL level.
"This is our guy," general manager Ron Hextall said several times yesterday.
"If Dave had never been a head coach, [this would be a] different conversation," Hextall said. "Being a head coach, being the guy in charge, making the tough decisions, putting your lines together, the gut feels you have on putting the right players out at the right time. He's got all that experience. Yes, it's at a different level, but he's got that experience."
Hakstol was a defenseman at North Dakota who went on to play 250 games in the International Hockey League, where he compiled 455 penalty minutes.
He coached 20 NHL players while at UND and made the Frozen Four - the hockey equivalent of college basketball's Final Four - an astounding seven times in his 11 seasons. Jonathan Toews, T.J. Oshie and Travis Zajac are among his most notable players. Current Flyer Chris VandeVelde and Flyers farmhand Brett Hextall, Ron's son, also played at UND for Hakstol.
"In watching my son over the years, I grew an appreciation for Dave, the way he coached," Ron Hextall said. "I thought about him long before this as a head coach in the National Hockey League. I believe he was destined for it. He's got a lot of pro qualities. He's got a lot of experience as a head coach."
Just not at this level, where becoming an ex-coach is as easy as missing the playoffs a few times.
This seems to be the Era of Faith in the Philadelphia sports scene. The football team is banking on a quarterback who has seen more operating rooms than playoff games. The basketball team somehow keeps getting younger every year. And now the hockey team is rolling the dice on a college coach.
Strange days, indeed.
"I'm a pretty detailed person and I work through things," Hakstol said. "Hey, you go into things with your eyes wide open and my eyes are wide open. I know what the statistics are [of coaching turnover]. But my mind is on the opportunity and the job ahead and the work that I have to do."
Bio
Name: Dave Hakstol
Age: 46. Position: Flyers head coach.
Previous job: Head coach, University of North Dakota (2004-15).
At North Dakota: Went 289-143-43 (.654 pct.) and reached the NCAA Tournament national semifinals seven times in 11 seasons ... Lost a heartbreaker in the 2014 Frozen Four at the Wells Fargo Center when Minnesota scored a game-winning goal with 1 second left Notable: Born in Warburg, Alberta, a town about 1 square mile with a population of 789, according to the 2011 Canada census ... Dallas Stars coach Lindy Ruff also is a Warburg native ... Hakstol and wife Erinn have two children, 9-year-old daughter Avery and son Brenden, who turns 7 today. They've lived in Grand Forks, N.D. for 15 years. Up next: Meeting the players and evaluating assistant coaches.. .