Coach Gulutzan made Flames hockey fun again
Earning respect of players helped first-year coach lead team to playoffs
Calgary Flames bench boss Glen Gulutzan wasn’t planning to deliver a spine-tingling speech before Thursday’s Game 1. He didn’t need one. “There’s a difference between being scared, and being scared to let down someone,” said Flames winger Kris Versteeg, providing some insight into the effectiveness of a so-called players’ coach.
“I think when you’re scared to let down someone, it’s a little extra motivation.”
True, the Flames enjoyed a couple of cold ones on their nowinfamous train trip from Montreal to Ottawa in late January, but now you know the real reason for their turnaround after that blowout loss at the Bell Centre.
They let Gulutzan down that night. They don’t want it to happen again.
“He’s made hockey fun, I think, for everyone,” Versteeg said prior to Thursday’s opener of a best-ofseven series between the Flames and Pacific Division-winning Anaheim Ducks.
“I know for myself, having a couple of up-and-down years with injuries and certain things, you come here and it was just such a breath of fresh air playing for him. He gives roles to each and every guy. He’s a players’ coach. He wants everybody to succeed.” The feeling is mutual. No NHLer, of course, is going to publicly badmouth the boss, but there’s nothing fake about the Flames’ respect and admiration for the 45-year-old Gulutzan.
In fact, guys in the opposite locker-room have been quick with compliments, too.
He wasn’t about to divulge the details, but Ducks defenceman Kevin Bieksa hinted after Thursday’s morning skate at Honda Center that he was among those quizzed as Calgary’s coaching search narrowed last spring.
“The hockey world is a pretty small world. So when you play for somebody, questions start being asked about what kind of guy he is,” Bieksa said.
“And every time I talk about Gully, I have nothing but positive things to say. I think he’s a great coach. I think he gets it. He’s kind of the new type of coach where it’s a combination of communication and knowing when to push down.
“So I’m happy to see him doing well.”
Ditto for Ducks centre Ryan Kesler.
“He’s a really good guy,” said Kesler, another ex-Canuck now skating in SoCal. “Good coach and he turned their season around, so I’m proud of him for that.”
Gulutzan won’t mind being called a good guy — and he is — but he doesn’t want credit for the Flames’ U-turn from fall flop to wild-card finisher. Too bad. “I think he’s the No. 1 reason we are where we are and he deserves all the credit in the world,” said Flames general manager Brad Treliving of the man he hired to replace Bob Hartley last June.
“I think he’s done a lot of things with our group in a short amount of time.
“We had some challenges to start, probably not unlike a lot of other teams. Camp, I always refer to as clunky, because we were missing guys. We were trying to incorporate new people. We had a new coaching staff …
“To go from that to where we are at the end of the regular season, I think his fingerprints are all over it, and I couldn’t be more proud of the job he has done.”
The job, of course, is only beginning, but there’s no underestimating Gulutzan’s impact in his first season at the Saddledome.
His captain, Mark Giordano, has praised his calm and consistency.
Prior to Thursday’s late date in Anaheim, Dougie Hamilton called the coach a “great motivator” and added “it’s been really a pleasure to play for him.”
Perhaps the best way to put it is that Gulutzan has come as advertised.
“When you do your homework and then spend some time with him, get to know him, he’s got a real ability to connect with people and he cares about people,” Treliving said. “It’s funny, you hear the term players’ coach and it should never be confused with (thinking) there’s a softness to him.
“Behind closed doors, when he needs to bite and take a bite of somebody, his teeth can dig as deep as anybody. But when you get to know him, he has a true caring for his players. He has a true caring for the people around him. He wants what’s best for you.”