Chicago Blackhawks: Who’s the new guy on the bench?
By Clay Swallow
The Chicago Blackhawks have fired legendary coach Joel Quenneville and have hired rookie coach Jeremy Colliton. Here’s all you need to know about him.
There will be a lot of buzz surrounding the new Chicago Blackhawks head coach when he is behind the bench for his first game on Thursday night, but who exactly are the Blackhawks getting in coach Jeremy Colliton? I have watched a good amount of Rockford Icehogs games over the past year and have noticed a few things about the coach.
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The first thing that should be mentioned is that Colliton has basically been labeled the successor for Coach Q since he arrived in Rockford from Sweden. He was expected to be the next coach of the Blackhawks when they decided to move on from Q, however, it was not expected to be this soon.
Colliton is viewed as a great communicator and a great voice who gets along well with younger players (He should, he’s only 33). He has a new school way of thinking and an aggressive mindset on both the offensive and defensive side of things. Needless to say, I am very excited to see the energy that Colliton will bring to the team.
The thing that you notice is that Colliton is very high energy all the time. He brings energy from behind the bench and his players reflect their coach’s energy on the ice with a fast place of play. Colliton likes to push the puck up the ice and push the pace of the game as well.
He exudes quiet confidence in his interviews and even in the introductory press conference you could tell that he knew exactly how to answer questions. It seemed he was almost excited that he had a good answer in store for every question asked. That is huge for a young coach, especially one coming into a locker room with such a mixture of established superstars and young, unproven kids.
The one big schematic change that we will see from Colliton will be defensively. He does not have the defensemen sit back in their own zone in transition, but instead coaches them to attack the neutral zone and try to force mistakes to get the puck back. That is a huge change from the current scheme that they have played for 10 years.
It will be interesting to see what offensive changes Colliton brings to the team, whether it be line changes or schematically changing things. Colliton is viewed as a great offensive coach, so it will be exciting to see what he can do with some of the all-world talents on the Blackhawks.
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One important nugget from Colliton’s first press conference that could determine how successful he is here in Chicago is him saying that he was not going to try to be Coach Q. This will be huge for his success here because no one is Quenneville, nor should anyone try to be him. As a young coach, you have to be yourself and make it work for you to have any chance of success. For his case, and for the Blackhawks case, I sure hope he does.