The Charlie Effect

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This article was published 24/11/2017 (2900 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

ANAHEIM, Calif. — He’s been a part of the NHL landscape for nearly four decades, 17 years on the ice and 19 more behind the bench, including the last seven as an assistant coach with the Winnipeg Jets.

He was one of the Edmonton Oilers’ true unsung heroes as the steady, reliable defensive partner of free-wheeling future NHL hall-of-famer Paul Coffey, hoisting five Stanley Cups with a team that dominated hockey through the 1980s.

The Great One, Wayne Gretzky, still considers him one of the most inspirational teammates he played with during his illustrious career.

His bosses in Winnipeg have leaned on him heavily to run a much-maligned defensive group that, over time, has undergone an overhaul and is now, unarguably, the most talented the city has witnessed to date from Jets 2.0.

There’s something to this Charlie Huddy guy.

“Listen, he knows the game as well as anyone, he loves the game and I know he loves working for the coaching staff there and loves being part of the Winnipeg organization. Those young guys are learning from one of the nicest, smartest people who ever played,” says Gretzky. “I know he’s doing a great job coaching that young defensive group. He’s smart, he’s always positive — he’s not a guy that hollers — and he’s been through the battles. They couldn’t have a better guy.”

Huddy, 58, has been with Winnipeg from the very beginning, introduced as part of former head coach Claude Noel’s staff during the summer of 2011, not long after the Dallas Stars cut ties with its coaching staff.

He was an interesting hire in these parts and has been under scrutiny ever since, working with a defence that has had more than its share of struggles. An integral player with Edmonton during a time when the Gretzky-led club was running roughshod over Winnipeg in the old Smythe Division, would Jets fans forgive and forget?

“We did give it to the Jets a few times,” Huddy says, chuckling. “We had a special team in Edmonton, winning those Cups. Almost right from the start you could feel it, the way the team was built by (Oilers’ former scouting director) Barry Fraser and Slats (former GM and coach Glen Sather). Everybody was close to being the same age and we were driven by some really great players, with Wayne leading the way and, obviously, Mess (Mark Messier) close behind and then Glenn Anderson and (Paul) Coffey.

“Edmonton’s always going to have a special place in my heart. But it’s like anything in this game. You go to a new place and now you’re hoping to be able to do the kinds of things with that organization that you did with the Oilers. I work for the Jets, and my No. 1 goal has always been to work with players and share my experiences of how we won… bring that knowledge and experience and get us moving on to the next level.”

His popularity mattered little. Most critical was whether he could help mould a winning culture within a franchise that had done a pile of losing in its time in Atlanta before relocating north.

The results certainly weren’t apparent overnight as the first-year Jets — boasting a D-core of Dustin Byfuglien, Toby Enstrom and Mark Stuart, along with long-departed Ron Hainsey, Zach Bogosian and Johnny Oduya — finished 26th in the league in goals-against and did not make the playoffs.

Midway through the team’s third season, mired in a slump, Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff fired Noel and brought in Paul Maurice in an effort to right the ship. Assistant coach Perry Pearn was also relieved of his duties. Huddy, however, was retained, completed the season with Maurice and then returned in the fall to run the back end.

It wasn’t until Year 4 — the team’s first full season with Maurice behind the bench — that the team demonstrated real signs of improvement on defence. Quite frankly, the opposite should have transpired; at various points, and with plenty of overlap, Enstrom, Stuart, Bogosian, Byfuglien and newcomers Jacob Trouba and Grant Clitsome were off the ice, nursing long-term injuries.

Somehow the Jets elevated their defensive game and — with the addition of Tyler Myers in a trade with the Buffalo Sabres and the surprising play of Ben Chiarot and Adam Pardy — made their only appearance to date in the NHL playoffs.

Maurice says that’s when Huddy’s worth to the organization really came to the forefront.

“Not many teams could survive that and not just make the playoffs, but set a franchise record (43-26-13, 99 points). Charlie’s ability to manage people in and out of that lineup that year was spectacular, as good as I’ve ever seen in terms of running a bench,” Maurice says.

“He’s very talented at it, and, as our our team got better and the talent pool increases back there, his experience becomes even more of a factor for us.”

Entry to the league’s post-season party looks entirely possible with a current blue-line corps that includes Byfuglien, Enstrom (currently out until the new year with a leg injury) Chiarot, Trouba, Josh Morrissey, Myers and off-season free-agent addition Dmitry Kulikov, with impressive rookie Tucker Poolman waiting in the wings and continued solid goaltending from Connor Hellebuyck and Steve Mason.

Maurice credits Huddy’s quiet, sensible approach to coaching as a huge asset, particularly on a team with rising-star rearguards Trouba and Morrissey.

“He fits my personality well because we’re not the same,” he says. “Charlie’s a relaxed guy, and I would be less so. (Jets assistant coach) Jamie (Kompon) has a really good head for the game… Charlie’s got a great heart for the game, a great feel for it. So when I lose my mind, I’ve got that support.”

Maurice also has the help of assistant coach Todd Woodcroft, goalie coach Wade Flaherty and video coach Matt Prefontaine.

“As the head guy, you need some anchors there, too, so when you start flying off the handle you have a guy who can make sure you don’t lose touch with it,” Maurice says.

Big, rugged, mobile Byfuglien — whose time in Winnipeg is a constant balancing act of risk and reward — says Huddy’s experience, style and demeanour are key reasons for the back end’s slow but steady strides over the years.

“He’s just an unbelievable guy to be around. Who he is, what he’s done and what he’s accomplished in his playing days, that’s important. He has a real knack for the game,” says the 12-year NHLer, from Roseau, Minn. “I’ve really enjoyed having him behind the bench at all times for us.

“He’s handles himself well and knows how to push you to get better in the right way without pushing you away. He’s been great back there. For me, it doesn’t take much to keep me going but he always seems to say the right things.”

So, what makes the 58-year old father of two (he and wife, Karen, have a daughter, Amanda, and son, Ryan) and grandfather of eight tick? What spurred the only child of Lucy and Bill Huddy, an elevator installer in Scarborough, Ont., to settle on hockey as a lifetime career, win five NHL championships and share a locker room on three different teams — Edmonton, the Los Angeles Kings and New York Rangers (as an assistant coach) — with No. 99, the best of them all?

Huddy maintains he was just another Canadian kid in the 1960s and ‘70s who fell in love with the game watching Bobby Orr rushing up the ice and scoring in spectacular fashion.

“I wanted to play and I was pretty fortunate that I had parents who were supportive and took me to all my games,” recalls Huddy, whose folks have since passed away. “Pretty soon, before you even know it, you’re moving up in hockey and playing junior in Oshawa with some pretty good hockey players. “

He spent two years there with the Ontario Hockey League’s Generals, registering 20 goals and 58 points in his final season in 1978-79 on a squad that included future NHLers Steve Konroyd, Tom McCarthy and Lee Norwood, and also current Montreal Canadiens’ bench boss Claude Julien.

Undrafted, Huddy signed his first pro contract with the Houston Apollos of the Central Hockey League and played one season, catching the eye of the Oilers and signing with the NHL team in time for the 1980-81 campaign.

Playing with Edmonton’s farm club in Wichita, Kan., Huddy got called up midway through the season to skate with the Oilers. At Maple Leaf Gardens, of all places. A day after that memorable debut, something special happened in Chicago.

“I scored my first goal in my second NHL game on a slapshot, beat Tony Esposito five-hole,” Huddy recalls fondly. “That was pretty cool, because as a kid you’re watching hockey and Tony’s one of the great goalies and then, all of a sudden, you’re playing against him and scoring your first goal.”

Huddy dressed for a dozen games that winter and 41 the next season, bouncing between Wichita and Edmonton, finally becoming a fixture on the Oilers’ blue line in 1982-83. That’s when Sather created one of the game’s all-time great defensive pairings.

Huddy and Coffey were pretty much inseparable, on and off the ice, for five seasons in Edmonton, winning Cups together in 1984, 1985 and 1987 before Coffey was traded to Pittsburgh just over a month into the 1987-88 season following a contract dispute.

A stay-at-home type of defenceman, Huddy found a niche partnering with the game’s premier skating rearguard.

“He was instrumental in my career, on and off the ice. He was a just lot of fun to be around,” says Coffey. “He was huge for us because he was so steady. He wasn’t flashy, but he didn’t go unnoticed. He made me what I was, allowed me to be loose and have fun. I liked to play a risky game and he was always back there.

“And D-to-D (passing), the puck was always on the stick from Charlie. There was nobody better back then. He’d get that puck, draw a couple of guys in and get it back to me and I’d go up the ice.”

The Oilers’ sheer dominance regularly resulted lopsided numbers on the scoreboard, and that set up some shenanigans courtesy of the tandem’s point-producer.

“If we were up 4-1 or 5-1, I didn’t mind throwing the puck into Charlie’s feet just to see if he could get out of it before he got run over,” Coffey says, laughing. “That’s actually true. I laugh about it to this day because it’s actually mean, but that’s the stuff we used to do.

“And he handled it perfect, made the play and yelled something funny back to me.”

Paired with a 100-point guy, Huddy knew exactly what his job was on the explosive Oilers.

“I knew that if I played my game, it would let Paul be free to do more of his thing,” says Huddy, who dressed for the Oilers’ alumni team during the Heritage Classic weekend at Winnipeg’s Investors Group Field 13 months ago.

“I was pretty quiet in the room. We had enough leaders. When you have Gretz and Mess, we didn’t need much more after that. Those guys could take charge of a room.”

Huddy was badly injured during the third round of the 1987-88 playoff run against Detroit and had to undergo emergency surgery to drain blood from his leg, miraculously returned to play the fourth and deciding game of the Stanley Cup final against Boston and got to raise hockey’s holy grail over his head again.

“It’s a corny story, but it’s so true. You grow up dreaming of playing in the NHL and winning a Stanley Cup. And then for a short period of time you get to skate around the ice with it. It’s all yours for 15 or 20 seconds and then you hand it off to someone else. It’s a special feeling,” he says.

Huddy played parts of 11 seasons with Edmonton before signing as a free agent in Los Angeles and reuniting with Gretzky, Jari Kurri and Marty McSorley. The crazy days working as one of the parts that made up then-owner Bruce McNall’s plaything, were indeed memorable.

“We were around celebrities all the time but they weren’t coming to see me. They were coming to see Wayne,” he says. “(Former golf great) Craig Stadler was there. (Beloved Canadian comedy actor) John Candy was around. He was there during the run in ‘93 when we lost to Montreal in the final.

“I remember against Toronto in Game 7 (of the conference final), he came into the locker room with maybe five minutes to go before warmup and just starting going on with a little speech. He just walked in on us and he this big beard growing and he was like, ‘You guys gotta win this series and move on and get to the Stanley Cup final so I can shave off this damn beard.’”

Huddy says he was drawn to coaching almost immediately once his splendid 1,017-game, 453-point playing career ended after the 1996-97 season in the Buffalo organization. He dressed for just one game with the Sabres, while spending 63 with the club’s AHL affiliate, the Rochester Americans, as a quasi-playing coach for John Tortorella.

He would go on to assist John Muckler with the Rangers for two years and was by the side of former teammate Craig MacTavish on the Edmonton bench for eight years before moving on to Dallas.

Huddy says he wasn’t driven to have the final say on an NHL coaching staff, preferring to fill a crucial supporting role, not unlike his successful playing days.

“I always enjoyed working with the D. That’s my passion, I guess,” he says. “When I was in Edmonton with MacT, I pretty much had the freedom to run the defence the way that I saw fit through the course of the game. Now with Paul, it’s kind of the same deal. I run the D, we talk  between periods or if he wants to make some changes. He’s always the guy in charge, obviously. He’s got the trust in me to do the job.”

And the job is one in which his superiors and a legion of fans conduct an 82-game (and beyond, if the team continues to roll) performance review. He submits to his own, as well.

“At the end of the day, people look at the goalie and see if the goals are good or bad, and the next place they’re going to look is at the defence. ‘How could they allow six or seven goals?’ So, you always take it personally, you always feel like, ‘Did I have the right guys out there?’

“For me, it’s fortunate to have this group of guys back there. Absolutely, when you go through most games you can almost roll any of the six guys out because they’re all good NHL players,” he adds. “We have some young guys, it’s the NHL and they’re going to make some mistakes. But they’re learning. We’ve got good pieces.”

Morrissey, averaging just under 19 minutes of ice time per game, often against opponents’ top forward lines, says he’s like a sponge when it comes to listening to Huddy and learning what he needs to do to be successful.

“We watch video all the time, we’re always talking on the bench and he’s always shaping your game,” says Morrissey, 22, from Calgary. “You look what he was able to accomplish as a player, it’s pretty insane. He’s a great mentor to have, the situations he’s been in, the big games he’s been through, the teams he’s played on, the individuals he’s played with.

“We’re very lucky to have him, for sure.”

 

jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPJasonBell