Grand Rapids Griffins head coach Jeff Blashill was named the winner of the Louis A.R. Pieri Memorial Award as the most outstanding coach of the 2013-14 season, as voted on by other coaches and the media. Photo/Grand Rapids Griffins
[dropcap]G[/dropcap]rand Rapids Griffins head coach Jeff Blashill was in his office preparing for practice when he received the phone call. He was named the winner of the Louis A.R. Pieri Memorial Award, making him the American Hockey League’s coach of the year.
“The one thing I believe is that it shouldn’t be called the coach of the year, it should be called staff of the year,” he said when first asked. “If I am going to be recognized, then surely Jim Paek and Spiros Anastas, our two assistants here, should be recognized as well.”
The Grand Rapids Griffins and the AHL announced last week that Blashill was named the 2014 Coach of the Year after two season of great success as head coach.
“Other than that, my reaction was that a coach gets an award like this because their team goes out there and does a really good job and our team has gone out there and done a really good job,” Blashill said. “They’ve gone out there under a bunch of different circumstances and continue to win.”
The 40-year old from Sault Ste. Marie, Mich. helped lead the Griffins to the 2013 Calder Cup Championship last year, and continued to build the Griffins into a powerful championship contender again this year despite set backs.
Turnover this season has left the Griffins with only four of their top 12 scorers from a year ago and just three of their top 10 playoff producers to play a majority of this season in Grand Rapids. Despite this, the Griffins held the first place position in the Midwest Division since Nov. 3 until losing it last weekend and has been ranked as high as first in all of the AHL in the standings.
“The number one reason we have been able to maintain success here is that our leadership group here; and that would be our captains Jeff Hoggan, Brennan Evans and Nathan Paetsch; have created a culture in our locker room. That allows you to have success with a lot of moving parts. We’ve had a lot of different people but we’ve maintained the same leadership core,” Blashill said.
He added that Hoggan and the assistant captains demand that there’s a great work ethic everyday, they are selfless and that they are highly competitive athletes.
“That type of culture that they created has allowed us to handle any type of fluctuation and player movement that might have occurred over the last year,” Blashill said.
The coach also credit the Griffins “very good goaltending” from goalies Tom McCollum and Petr Mrazek, who have played in outstanding performances this season, as another reason for continued success.
Grand Rapids has also seen a great deal of success from guys sent to the team from Detroit, such as Jordin Tootoo and Corey Emmerton.
“They’ve come down here and embraced this team,” Blashill said. “They have been very, very selfless in their approach.
Grand Rapids ranks seventh in the AHL in offense (3.15 goals per game) and second in defense (2.42) at the end of the regular season heading into the postseason.
Blashill credits his staff for his and the team’s success over the last two seasons.
“Jim Paek has been an assistant here for nine years, I believe, and has been through a lot of different head coaches here. When I got the job here last year, he was a great resource for me on both a professional and personal level. One of the things as head coach is that there are some days where you ca be hard on your players and Jim has such a great admiration and respect from our players so he can definitely smooth over those times when things get rocky,” Blashill said.
Additionally, he also credits Anastas for his assistance through the season.
“Along with Anastas, they do all the pre-scouting, they make sure we know exactly what we are going to face so we’re never surprised by an opponent and Spiros as done a great job with that,” Blashill said.
On April 3, the Griffins announced that Anastas would be leaving the organization after two years once the season concluded to take over head coaching duties at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta.
“The one big thing with our staff is we have real good continuity, we challenge each other but we certainly work well together and that’s been a real positive,” Blashill said. “I have grown a lot in my two years here as coach and that’s largely because of the staff around here.”
Blashill is not only credited with success of the Griffins but also with a positive impact for the Detroit Red Wings. He has prepped 1o of this season’s players for their NHL debuts with nine of those as members of the Detroit Red Wings. A total of 18 players have been called up this year to play a total of 391 NHL games, with 13 of those players logging time in Detroit.
Because of the Griffins players brought up to Detroit this year, like Luke Glendenning and Tomas Jurco, the Red Wings have made it to the postseason for their 23rd consecutive season.
“One thing that I am fully aware of here is that one of my main responsibilities is to help develop our players to the best of their abilities so they can become great Red Wings,” Blashill said. “As a staff, we get pumped up when we see guys that we coached that have got called up that we coached do well for them and it’s a real feeling of happiness for them.”
With a record of 46-23-2-5 at the end of the regular season, the Griffins head into the postseason this week with the fourth-seed. They will face the fifth-seeded Abbotsford Heat in the first game of a best-of-five series Friday. The two teams have never faced each other in the postseason but Grand Rapids holds a 3-1 record over them this season.
“What I know for sure about the playoffs … is how hard it is and how hard it is to win,” Blashill said. “I think there’s a belief out there or a perception that the one seed will be much better than the eighth seed and that there are some upsets out there. In my mind, the teams are so close. I don’t believe there are any big upsets anymore because of how close the teams are.”
