After hearing the interviews, I am excited about is the mix of personalities and experience with the coaching staff. I think you can have a blunt prickly head coach (I do think this is how Peters will be) as long as the assistants are able to re-convey your message in a milder way. I think that is what we get out of Ward and Huska. I also think it works better this way than the head coach being milder with more prickly assistants ala Cameron/GG.
It's not often you get a chance to hire an NHL coach (assistant/associate or head) that has 10 years of NHL experience without being fired once as a coach. I can't think of one coach off the top of my head who has that track record. Not sure why people have any reservations about Ward as an assistant.
Based on who we have, I think we will see big adjustments on the PP set-up (maybe not the players but definitely where they are in the set-up) and in-game and game-to-game adjustments. I think we see very little change in the 5v5 systems. IMO the biggest change and the one that was most needed will be the messaging and accountability of the players.
If there is only one adjustment to the roster that pushes Hathaway out of the top 9, I am very confident we make the playoffs with this staff in place.
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