1. Best line about Martin St. Louis’s hiring came from one of his former coaches: “I can’t wait for the first time one of his players grabs a stat sheet, angrily pointing at his ice-time and saying, ‘You didn’t play me enough!’” St. Louis apparently was famous for that.
There were jokes about St. Louis being a PeeWee coach and he referenced it himself at his media conference, but he’s always used those kinds of doubts as red meat on his Hall-of-Fame journey. “I'm not coming here to be a substitute teacher,” he said. “I have every intention of being here a long time.” John Tortorella (not the source of the previous quote) tried to get St. Louis to commit full-time to Columbus, and there were times Montreal executive VP Jeff Gorton wanted him more involved with the Rangers. But it was always going to be on St. Louis’ schedule, when he was no longer going to be coaching his sons. GM Kent Hughes and St. Louis grew close when their children played together, and people who know both weren’t anywhere near as surprised as the rest of us.
2. Why now, and not after the season? A couple of reasons. First, you can’t allow your young players to think too many efforts like this week’s 7-1 loss to New Jersey are acceptable. “It’s time for our team right now to start showing…that we’re not going to roll over,” Hughes said. “We understand that we’re not going to make the playoffs, but we’re not going to roll over.” The Canadiens had too many lifeless performances. Second, Gorton/Hughes are about to make franchise-altering personnel decisions. They wanted St. Louis to collect information up-close and in-place. See who is part of the problem and who is part of the solution. They trust his input and want that intel.
3. St. Louis appeared one year ago on the
Hockey IQ podcast with Greg Revak and Dan Dukart. He said that as the kids he coached got older, he’d send them clips with a request that they let him know what he’s looking for. “I’d like them to search for the answer instead of me giving them the answer.” Other philosophical highlights: “The most important guys on the ice are the guys without the puck, not the guy with the puck…While the puck carrier is doing that, everybody else has to cover ice and get between the coverage,” and “Every game you’re going to have three, four, five plays that you want back…I definitely don’t want them to think they’ve got to play a perfect game…I’d rather you make a bad read than no read at all.”
4. There was a rumour Tortorella might join St. Louis as an assistant. He said no with a laugh: “I’d be the worst assistant coach ever.”
