Rochester Americans hiring Mike Leone for HC

[dudacek]

38 minutes ago, MattPie said:

Ruff literally worked for Pegula as NHL head coach before, he's the ultimate "we know this guy already". 🙂 Nolan was also a Sabres guy, although that's a bit more tenuous.

Karmanos, Sexton, Ventura, and Bylsma: Pegula, IIRC, has some Pens connections (his empire is largely based in Western PA). Can I amend the pattern to include people that worked for the Pens? There's a strong current of raiding the Pens' org for people, which like the USNTLP is "someone we know".

(I didn't check on Patrick because I don't know who that is, lol. unless we're talking James Patrick)

The pattern we were discussing was the hiring of first-timers in key positions.

There certainly was a “know this guy already” vibe with Ruff and some of the others you cite.

But there is none whatsoever that I’m aware of with the topic of this thread, Leone, or his predecessor Appert.

I don’t know that the Sabres hire “guys they know” more than other teams. The team I follow the next most closely, Vancouver, is stuffed full of Jim Rutherford connections.

Rutherford has earned more of a benefit of the doubt.

[MattPie]

38 minutes ago, Taro T said:

Craig Patrick.  From the Patrick family (essentially NHL royalty, his grand dad was Lester Patrick (yes, THAT Lester Patrick) and his father was Lynn Patrick).  Played in the NHL for a long time, was one of the few GOOD (not great, but good) California Golden Seals that didn't get immediately poached like some of the others such as Reggie Leach.  Had a long career but always seemed to end up on bad teams.  (Even though he was a Patrick, he also was an American, might've had something to do with the good teams staying away.)

Was the Assistant Coach to Herb Brooks on THAT Olympic Team.

GM of the Pens when they won back to back Stanley Cups.

Was an advisor to the Sabres soon after Pegula bought them.

Duh, thanks. I was brain farting on that one. I'm now thinking that Craig Patrick is the root of the Pens-affinity in the Sabres' hiring. I vaguely remember talk of "pulling people from the Pens because they're successful" early in Pegula's ownership.

4 minutes ago, dudacek said:

The pattern we were discussing was the hiring of first-timers in key positions.

There certainly was a “know this guy already” vibe with Ruff and some of the others you cite.

But there is none whatsoever that I’m aware of with the topic of this thread, Leone, or his predecessor Appert.

I don’t know that the Sabres hire “guys they know” more than other teams. The team I follow the next most closely, Vancouver, is stuffed full of Jim Rutherford connections.

Rutherford has earned more of a benefit of the doubt.

You're right, it might all be connections in other orgs.

Leone and Appert are both former USNTDP coaches, so "guys we've worked with".

[dudacek]

11 minutes ago, MattPie said:

Duh, thanks. I was brain farting on that one. I'm now thinking that Craig Patrick is the root of the Pens-affinity in the Sabres' hiring. I vaguely remember talk of "pulling people from the Pens because they're successful" early in Pegula's ownership.

You're right, it might all be connections in other orgs.

Leone and Appert are both former USNTDP coaches, so "guys we've worked with".

Not trying to argumentative, but I’m not aware any Sabres executives who actually worked either of those guys at the time they were hired.

When I see “guys we’ve worked with” I read it to mean that it means guys they actually worked with, like Adams and Ruff, or Karmanos and Ventura.

[PerreaultForever]

4 hours ago, Pimlach said:

Well, we had Peca in Rochester working for Appert.  He was down there for the year that Quinn/JJP were down there.  

Unfortunately,  Laviolette liked Peca enough to give him a shot as an NHL assistant, something that Granato did not do.  

Exactly, and who are the best two guys to come out of Rochester lately, Peterka and Quinn. 

Letting Peca go rather than promoting him was a big mistake. 

[Flashsabre]

 

[shrader]

On 6/10/2024 at 12:41 PM, Taro T said:

So far Pegula has built up the Penn State hockey program from scratch completely altering the college hockey landscape (and not for the better IMHO),

I’m kind of curious what you mean here. Penn State caused the birth of the Big 10, but it still all feels the same to me as it did before. The WCHA and the CCHA shuffled around a bit and became the Big 10 and NCHC. So it’s still back at 4 power conferences and two bottom feeder conferences.