From IceHog to IceDog
Ted Dent brings wealth of experience to Niagara’s staff after six-year run with Chicago’s top affiliate
The Xs and Os are very similar. The age group will be the different thing for me as a coach. These are 16- to 21-year-olds. I’ve been coaching 20- to 30-year-olds in the AHL.” Ted Dent, IceDogs associate coach
When rookie head coach Billy Burke of the Niagara IceDogs runs into something unexpected — as every coach does during the ups and downs of a long grinding season — he won’t have far to look for advice.
At the end of the bench will be Ted Dent, who spent the last six seasons as the head coach of the Rockford IceHogs of the AHL, the Chicago Blackhawk’s top farm team.
Dent, 47, had an overall record of 223-179-33-21 with Rockford and is the team’s all-time leader in games coached with 456.
“I can help Billy out with his adjustment as head coach and learn from some of my experiences,” Dent said. “You see a lot of coaches that drop back to assistant and stay in the game. We are coaches. We want to coach.
“This isn’t new territory. I started as an assistant. I was a head coach for seven years pro and assistant for six years pro,” he said.
“Assistant coaches can get a little more involved and have a different kind of communication with the players. As an assistant, you can do a little more comforting and give a few more pats on the back. I enjoy that part of the job.
“As a head coach, you still have that rapport with your guys — especially your returning ones — but a head coach has to learn to separate himself a bit. I went through that as well.”
Dent was born in Toronto and played Division 1 NCAA hockey at St. Lawrence University. He played professionally in the East Coast Hockey League and Central Hockey League before joining the coaching ranks in 2004.
He worked as an assistant and head coach in the East Coast League, then spent a year as an assistant with Norfolk in the AHL before joining the Blackhawks organization with Rockford, first as an assistant, then as head coach.
With the IceDogs, Dent will handle the defencemen and the penalty kill.
“I’m excited to be in the OHL and learn about this league,” Dent said. “I’ve never been in junior hockey in a coaching capacity. That said, coaching is coaching.
“The Xs and Os are very similar. The age group will be the different thing for me as a coach. These are 16- to 21-year-olds. I’ve been coaching 20- to 30-year-olds in the AHL.
“For the younger kids, you need a little more communication. You need to be more involved. Away from the rink, a lot of them are away from home for the first time and living with billets. They are still maturing and developing. They have a lot going on in their lives.”
Dent’s wife and three children — two girls and a boy ages 17, 15 and 12 — will be staying in Rockford during the season. His wife is American.
The Dents are firmly rooted in the city, which is about 140 kilometres west of Chicago in Illinois.
Dent’s best season with Rockford was 2014-15, when the IceHogs won 46 regular season games.
Rockford struggled through a rough 2016-17 campaign — winning just 25 games. The Blackhawks were re-tooling an aging roster on the fly, a process which took its toll on its AHL affiliate.
In the end, the organization decided it was time for a fresh start. Dent said he has no hard feelings.
“I have three Stanley Cup rings,” he said.
“Some organizations give their player development staff watches. Not the Blackhawks. They gave us the same rings they gave the players.
“I spent 10 years in one spot. In the coaching game, that’s remarkable.
“I have a lot of friends in Rockford and the Blackhawks organization, but I am pleased to be here. It is a new chapter for me, and I’m looking forward to it.”