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Habs hire Craig Ramsay as coaching consultant


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http://canadiens.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=777552

PRESS RELEASE

MONTREAL – Montreal Canadiens general manager Marc Bergevin, announced on Tuesday the appointment of Craig Ramsay as coaching consultant with the Club.

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“We are very pleased to welcome Craig Ramsay as coaching consultant. He has an impressive hockey background, having worked as an NHL coach for over 20 years, following a playing career that included over 1,000 games played. On a consulting basis, he will be called upon regularly during the season to share his knowledge with our coaching group. Our players will also benefit from his expertise”, said Bergevin.

Ramsay, 64, has nearly 40 years of experience with seven different National Hockey League organizations. He was an assistant coach for 18 of the past 20 years, totaling over 1,500 games as assistant coach, and over 150 games as head coach in the NHL.

In 2014-15, Ramsay was an assistant coach with the Edmonton Oilers. He also worked as an assistant coach with the Florida Panthers (1993 to 1995 and 2011 to 2014), the Boston Bruins (2007 to 2010), the Tampa Bay Lightning (2001 to 2007), the Philadelphia Flyers (1998 to 2000), the Ottawa Senators (1996 to 1998), and the Buffalo Sabres (1986-87). The Weston, Ontario native was the last head coach in the history of the defunct Atlanta Thrashers, during the 2010-11 season. He also took over as interim head coach in his debuts with the Sabres (21 games in 1986-87), and with the Flyers (53 games from 2000 to 2001). Ramsay etched his name on the Stanley Cup as a member of the Tampa Bay Lightning coaching staff in 2004.

Drafted by Buffalo in the second round (19th overall) in the 1971 NHL Entry Draft, Ramsay spent his entire NHL playing career with the Sabres (14 seasons), appearing in 1,070 games and recording 672 points (252-420-672). He also added 48 points in 89 playoff games (17 goals, 31 assists). Ramsay had eight consecutive 20-goal seasons, and was selected to the 1976 NHL All-Star Game. He appeared in 776 consecutive games from 1973 to 1983, the fourth longest consecutive game streak in NHL history. He also won the Frank J. Selke Trophy in 1985, awarded annually to the NHL’s best defensive forward.

In case you didn't know, Ramsay has a career reputation for helping powerplays and defensive units.

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Well, he is well travelled and been around a long time. But not sure what to think of the hiring. Needed or an upgrade somehow I don't know, but obviously Bergevin must think so.

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A heartening sign to be sure. The proof will, of course, be in the pudding. I can't resist mentioning that several posters on this site, including me, gave analogous analyses of the Habs' PP last season - although generally not in this polished sort of 'coach-speak.' Apparently what was obvious to many of us was not obvious to the Habs' coaches, and now they've got an in-house guy to point it out.

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"Apparently not obvious to the coaches"...is a bit of a stretch.

So let me understand; Bergevin, Lacarriere, Mellanby, Lapointe, Therrien, Lacroix, JJD were all oblivious to the PP woes? However, all they had to do was listen to the fans for 'the answer'? Hmmm :nuts:

Anyways, hope Ramsey can offer some help to the PP.

I think having Petry & Beaulieu as options for 2nd PP unit should help some.

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"Apparently not obvious to the coaches"...is a bit of a stretch.

So let me understand; Bergevin, Lacarriere, Mellanby, Lapointe, Therrien, Lacroix, JJD were all oblivious to the PP woes? However, all they had to do was listen to the fans for 'the answer'? Hmmm :nuts:

Sometimes they can't see the trees for the scotch, or something like that. Anyway I would say Bergevin was paying attention, and is getting help.

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In some jobs, you get paid for asking the questions or finding the problems, in other fields for answers and solutions. Statistics alone told us the PP sucked - Ramsay is here for solutions. Let's see if any of our posters recommend solutions the Habs now successfully employ!

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They are all keeping jobs because they are winning often and for 3 years now.

Would be easy to say that with a solid PP how much better they would be, but others would say they have been lucky with no 'major' injuries and goalie playing all-world.

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Lacroix should have been fired. There is no argument for keeping a guy who, given pretty good pieces, oversaw a pathetic power play that was the team's Achilles' Heel. Indeed, if Lacroix was doing a competent job, why bring in Ramsay in the first place?

The troubling thing about Ramsay's hiring may indeed be that it points to this culture of 'chumminess.' Rather than FIRE the bum responsible for the problem, they protect him from the consequences of his own ineptitude, keeping him on and instead adding yet another cook to the kitchen. Now, I doubt that Ramsay will hurt. But it's a bit worrisome that MB is not holding his own staff to the same ruthless 'perform-or-you're-gone' standards that he has applied to his players. Over the long run, this kind of clubby organizational culture will lead to complacency, allowing for an acceptance of mediocrity to seep in. I've seen this with the Vancouver Canucks, who protected their scouting staff for years and years despite pathetic results.

(On the other hand, far from being what I just suggested, Ramsay may be a warning shot across Therrien's bow. 'OK, you kept on Lacroix and that was your decision...but I'm bringing in a new guy here to compensate for what I suspect was a stupid move on your part.' Seen this way, it's a signal that MB is not impressed with MT on this particular file. I hope that this is actually what's going on).

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I have zero issue with Rick Dudley as our assistant GM saying, "You know, Craig Ramsay has always been an excellent communicator to players and he's right now unemployed after Edmonton cleaned house. We don't have to bring him on as an assistant coach. I think at his age he'd be fine working as a coaching consultant." because the first goal is to improve the team, second is to use your own connections to do it.

Stephane Waite came to Montreal and since then Price has won a Gold medal, a Hart trophy and a Vezina. Do you think if Pierre McGuire was the GM, the goalie coach of Chicago would jump from a Stanley Cup winning team (poised to win again) to us?

I've pointed out before that the Habs season PP seemed terrible but PP percentages around the league were down. Chicago won a Cup with a season PP only fraction points better than us. The Islanders went from one of the best regular season PPs to one of the worst playoff PPs. We stunk, but if you're Bergevin, talking to Therrien and Lacroix, and they explain in detail that the weak playoff PP was due to reasons that can be fixed, are you just gonna drop a bunch of pink slips or are you going to give them a shot to fix it?

Craig Ramsay is there to make sure they fix it. If we're losing games due to a weak PP and Bergevin and co. do nothing this season, then we can talk about chumminess.

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Good point, Machine. Certainly it is too soon to jump to definitive conclusions. (However, what if I were to ask why - if the problems with the PP are fixable, according to the coaches - they did not implement the fix last season?)

The PP did cost us games last year, in that our inability to score was a problem, especially in the playoffs. Even a couple of extra goals could have helped massively especially against TB. Going into the new season with the same coaching crew is acceptable provided there be no further tolerance for mediocre results. Like I said earlier, Therrien has doubled down on the status quo, and it's on him if the PP continues to compromise our chances to contend.

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Good point, Machine. Certainly it is too soon to jump to definitive conclusions. (However, what if I were to ask why - if the problems with the PP are fixable, according to the coaches - they did not implement the fix last season?)

The PP did cost us games last year, in that our inability to score was a problem, especially in the playoffs. Even a couple of extra goals could have helped massively especially against TB. Going into the new season with the same coaching crew is acceptable provided there be no further tolerance for mediocre results. Like I said earlier, Therrien has doubled down on the status quo, and it's on him if the PP continues to compromise our chances to contend.

I don't want to sound like an excuse machine for Therrien and Lacroix (I wanted Lacroix fired. Unless Ramsay didn't want to coach again, why not make him our PP coach?) but they could have pointed out the lack of dangerous shooters on our PP and that it had to always revolve around Pacioretty and Subban because everyone else was at best a "good" shooter and not a PP scoring one. They might have also brought up their struggles in front of the net. So what does Bergevin do? He trades for Kassian who can get in front of the net and Semin who has an elite wrist shot when healthy. He's giving Therrien/Lacroix new tools to work with on the PP and saying, "Screw this up and there's no excuses."

We had a league leading PP in 12-13. The difference between that team and the team today up front is replacing Gionta, Diaz and Ryder for Galchenyuk, Petry and Gallagher. Oh, and the PP coach. I guess that's important to mention...

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I don't want to sound like an excuse machine for Therrien and Lacroix (I wanted Lacroix fired. Unless Ramsay didn't want to coach again, why not make him our PP coach?) but they could have pointed out the lack of dangerous shooters on our PP and that it had to always revolve around Pacioretty and Subban because everyone else was at best a "good" shooter and not a PP scoring one. They might have also brought up their struggles in front of the net. So what does Bergevin do? He trades for Kassian who can get in front of the net and Semin who has an elite wrist shot when healthy. He's giving Therrien/Lacroix new tools to work with on the PP and saying, "Screw this up and there's no excuses."

We had a league leading PP in 12-13. The difference between that team and the team today up front is replacing Gionta, Diaz and Ryder for Galchenyuk, Petry and Gallagher. Oh, and the PP coach. I guess that's important to mention...

Yep, and as long as the boldfaced part is indeed Bergevin's attitude, then I've got no beef with him.

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They are all keeping jobs because they are winning often and for 3 years now.

Would be easy to say that with a solid PP how much better they would be, but others would say they have been lucky with no 'major' injuries and goalie playing all-world.

And "they" would be correct.

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The truth is that Le Genius is a lousy coach when it comes to the P/P, he has nver had success with it. Not in Pits and not here. The P/P goes downhill year after year. I am not saying that he is the P/P coach but that he does not have knowledge to be able to figure out that LaCroix has no idea what he is doing. So we bring in Ramsay, hopefully Le Genius listens to him. The p/p is a very important weapon and can make up for deficiencies elsewhere.

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I thought Lacroix was to blame for bad PP?

Who does Lacroix report to??? the buck stops with the coach.
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