Head Coach Mike Babcock starts his first season with the Huskies!
By Olivia Lawrence
RP Show Intern
It is not very often you get a National Hockey League (NHL) coach on a Saskatchewan university hockey bench, but the Huskies Men’s Hockey team in Saskatoon have it this year with Mike Babcock! This is not the first Canada Western University team Babcock has coached for, he did an eight month stint with the former Lethbridge Pronghorns in 1993-94. Now over 25 years later, he returns to university hockey in his hometown with 18 seasons of NHL experience.
Not only does Babcock get to coach in his home town near his family, his son Michael Babcock is an assistant coach alongside him.
“When you come to the U of S, you just see how passionate the people are about the university,” said Babcock on Friday’s episode of The Rod Pedersen Show. “When you see the alumni, when you see the players, when you see this rink, you’re proud to be a part of it. I think it’s special, and like I said, when you have the opportunity to work with your son, my son’s 26 years old, he’s already graduated from university, he’s played pro overseas, he’s done his thing. He’s trying to figure out where to go, that’s fun, because he’s an adult, he gets a say. I think that’s impressive.”
After Babcock found out he got the job, he threw himself into the recruiting process trying to get talented players to come play for the team. There were some disappointments along the way, but Babcock understands that players are going to choose professional opportunities if they get the option. Nevertheless, he is confident with the group of guys he has.
“It’s very competitive in Canada West, you can coach all you want, but you need athletes to coach,” said Babcock.
The Huskies roster consists of three Junior A players, and the rest have come from the Western Hockey League (WHL).
“The game breaker at the NHL level is two-to-three guys on each team that create space every time they touch the puck,” said Babcock. “So when a guy touches the puck with unreal skill, everyone backs off and gives them room. There’s not that here, you know, you got one or two guys, but it’s really not that, so it becomes tight protecting up and down the rink so you got to grind and it’s hard to score.”
Babcock was also a university hockey player before making a name for himself as a head coach. He played for the Huskies and then McGill University where he graduated.
On the coaching side of things, Babcock’s experience is vast, he coached college, university, WHL and the American Hockey League (AHL) prior to the NHL. In the NHL, he won two Stanley Cup Finals as a coach and became the winningest coach in Red Wings history, leading the team to the playoffs every year he coached.
Now Babcock has stepped into a new atmosphere and style of hockey, and he is excited for the new challenge.
“We seem to be a resilient group, we stay at it hard, obviously it’s a big game here tonight,” said Babcock. The emotions sometimes get in the way of the home opener, you like to get through it and get on with it, but the reality of the situation, it’s good hockey. They play hard, we got good team depth and we plan on going after the other team here tonight.”
The Huskies first game is tonight (Oct.22) at 7pm against the Regina Cougars. U of S will see if they can capture their first win at home in Merlis Belsher Place. The Saskatoon facility is known as a NHL caliber facility, 1,500 tickets have been sold so far for tonight’s game.
