DU Fans Toast WCHA Champion In Magness

Here's to you Mr. Hardworking Assistant Hockey Coach Derek Lalonde
A real American hero [Cue Bud Light theme music]

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Ass Coaches truly are underrated - on any hockey team. I don't think most people have a clue how important they are, or what they do with the team besides stand behind the bench for 60 minutes. The Head Coach always gets the glory.... but he can only be as good as his people.

dggoddard said...

Agreed.

444 said...

Many head coaches don't even attend practice, the assistants do most of the day to day work.

Anonymous said...

I agree with the first comment. When I first started following the program I had no idea how important Appert, Miller, Tanzer, etc. were.

However, Gwoz constantly praises them and if you pay any sort of attention to him you'll know how important they are. He always gives them 100% credit for recruiting and pretty much any praise that an interviewer tries to give him.

The importance that Appert and Lalonde have played in developing goalies is also incredible. Gwoz deserves credit for recognizing how important a goalie coaach is and hiring the appropriate assistant (because many programs do not) but the perforance of Chevy, Manno, Fisher, Berkhoel, Dubbie, etc. was greatly improved by the assistants. Take Chevy, he was benched on his junior team with horrible stats, he comes to DU and is now arguably the best goalie in the country.

Anonymous said...

Derek went through a little hair growth trial experiment over the holidays; he was starting to look like the Geico Caveman! Thank God he came to his senses again and shaved that beautiful head. Maybe he figured, the Sioux couldn't scalp him in 4 tries.... so he might as well do it himself! He's a great guy - and a big part of why this team is successful.