Fellow coaches expect Krueger to thrive, adjust with Sabres
Mike Babcock and Ralph Krueger’s relationship goes back to 2004 and countless conversations since about coaching in the NHL.
The Toronto Maple Leafs coach just wishes Krueger hadn’t join ed the rival Buffalo Sabres to make his job more difficult.
“It didn’t thrill me that he’s just down the road, but that’s the way life is,” Babcock said. “He’s going to help their team out.”
Babcock and other coaches who have worked closely with Krueger over the years are glad he’s back as a part of their fraternity after five years as chairman of English Premier League soccer club Southampton FC. Krueger’s friends and colleagues in hockey believe he’ll have more success than during his ill-fated 2013 season in Edmonton but also that there will be a steep learning curve in the first year back in the NHL.
“He’ll find it taxing in his first year,” said Ken Hitchcock, who worked with Krueger on Babcock’s gold medal-winning Canada staff at the 2014 Olympics. “The way you win in the NHL and the way you play defense in the NHL has really changed in the last few years. And he’s going to have to have people help him with those adjustments and recognize
what they are because even since he coached the Oilers, things have changed a lot. I think he’ll embrace those adjustments, but there will be adjustments.”
Six full seasons removed from his only 48 games of NHL head-coaching experience, Krueger said he now has a better idea of how to plan out the year from beginning to end. Despite Buffalo’s NHL-worst eight-year playoff drought, Krueger believes his team can contend right away.
Krueger certainly carries a reputation for helping teams overachieve, including his first three seasons at Southampton amid the departure of several key players.
“That was a great opportunity for him,” Babcock said. “I talked to him a lot over the time there. It was a growing experience. I think it was a good challenge.”
Like that challenge in management, Krueger’s 13 years as coach of Switzerland’s national team was about establishing a standard of play, a process that can take years before results follow.
“Ralph’s all about culture creates chemistry, which creates winning,” Hitchcock said. “He’s not looking at winning. He’s looking at culture. He looks way down the road. Ralph is a big-time believer in fulltime success.”