KNOBLAUCH LEAVES WOLF PACK FOR EDMONTON JOB
By: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings
Hartford, CT – Hartford Wolf Pack General Manager Ryan Martin shocked the team’s roster when he informed them that head coach Kris Knoblauch had left to assume the head coaching position with the Edmonton Oilers.
After the team had a dreadful start, the Oilers relieved Jay Woodcroft of his duties.
Knoblauch going to Edmonton reunites him with Connor McDavid, who he coached for three years with the Erie Otters (OHL) in 2012-2014.
Joining Knoblauch with Edmonton as his assistant is Oilers legend and one-time Hartford Whaler (20 games) Paul Coffey.
When Keith McCambridge was relieved, Knoblauch joined the Rangers organization on July 29, 2019. He was the second choice after Steve Spott turned it down when conditions did not suit him. The Edmonton job is Knoblauch’s first as an NHL head coach.
This is not Knoblauch’s first NHL experience. He was an assistant with Dave Hakstol and Ian Laperrière with the Lehigh Valley Phantoms and former New Haven Nighthawk Kjell Samuelsson.
As the seventh head coach in Wolf Pack history, Knoblauch coached 241 games and compiled a record of 119-90-18-14. He had just one playoff appearance, which came last spring.
KNOBLAUCH REPLACEMENT
New York Rangers President and General Manager Chris Drury and Martin named Steve Smith as interim head coach. Jamie Tardif remains, as does goalie coach Jeff Malcolm, who was on the Wolf Pack bench Sunday.
Knoblauch, a Prince Albert, SK native, had his share of trials in Hart City.
He was recalled twice to coach the Rangers because of COVID protocols, first stepping in for David Quinn and then later, Gerard Gallant.
In his first year in Hartford, he avoided the ignominy of going from first to fourth when the pandemic ended the season.
One factor could have been the recall of the unofficial AHL MVP that year, Igor Shesterkin.
He handled the 25-game pandemic season and its three-team division as the best anybody could. The team lost the first seven games, and Knoblauch then threw the COVID playbook out the window, but they got hot and played Providence for the Atlantic Division title.
The 2021-22 season saw the team go from first to nearly last in the division, finishing the final two months with a dreadful 8-20-8 record.
Last year, successful deadline trades helped him end an eight-year playoff drought.
Recently, he’s had to compete with losing two goalies, defensemen and forwards. It left him with a depleted defense corps and even being forced to sign a Division II club hockey goalie as an emergency backup.
As a professional, Knoblauch speaks gently and politely, minus any unsavory language, and in expository sentences. He remains calm and relaxed and maintains an unflustered demeanor – most of the time – despite what must have been trying circumstances.
Knoblauch snapped in his first year in Laval when the referees were caught looking at the scoreboard to decide a call in OT.
A second time, after he benched Vitali Kravtsov after a lackadaisical first period of his first game.
The third was when Lias Andersson exited to Sweden without telling him after returning from two bad games in Charlotte.
“(Knoblauch) felt betrayed by (Andersson). When he left us, he was gone. We thought he was recalled by the Rangers. I thought he was kidding,” a former player said.
In Knoblauch’s first head coaching position, he inherits a challenging situation but is undoubtedly helped by having a roster containing two of the best players in the NHL.
