VOICES: JACK CAPUANO
Bridgeport coach on being in sync with Gordon
Found on every NHL coach’s weekly To Do list is a note to call the coach of his team’s American Hockey League affiliate. It’s important to be updated on which players deserve promotions and how the prospects are coming along. To use a neighborly example, Tom Renney is known to dial Hartford Wolf Pack head coach Ken Gernander at least once or twice a week.
The number of times Ted Nolan reached out to Bridgeport counterpart Jack Capuano last season: zero.
The reasons were never quite clear – Ted’s son Brandon was let go by Bridgeport, the coach’s rep for preferring older players, maybe he just didn’t want to – but it was an alarming fact of life. Not the way for a team to develop prospects, we can all agree.
Capuano refused to get into this subject when I called him the other day. He refused to confirm or deny – that’s okay, I can – and insisted on moving on. Capuano was willing to open up about not getting the Islanders job, his thoughts on Scott Gordon and his role in the Islanders’ rebuild.
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“Like every coach, my goal is to get to the NHL. But I’m very happy where I am right now. I spoke with Garth when the Islanders’ job opened up. He was fair with me. He told me he had a lot of faith in my ability to bring along our prospects, and this was an especially important job in the organization right now. He said he had a few candidates in mind he felt were the right guys for the Islanders. I was okay with it because Garth and I have known each other a while and have a straight-forward relationship. We don’t BS each other.
“Everyone in the organization knows exactly what the game plan is and we’re fully committed to it. Garth has met with all of us. We are going to build through the draft, build through Bridgeport. It’s an exciting time. It’s up to me and my staff to make sure our players are in position to succeed when they are called up by the Islanders and to bring along all of these skilled young players. The NHL is about winning hockey games. Here, of course we want to create an environment of winning, but development is the most important aspect.
“From top to bottom, Scott and I will be in sync. We will talk regularly. What he is preaching on the Island is what I’ll be teaching in Bridgeport. Our systems will be very similar. The only place where you could have even the slightest of difference could sometimes be on the power play. That’s determined by the skills of the players I have on my roster for a given game. If most of our top guys are with the Islanders as injury fill-ins, sometimes we have to make adjustments. Other than that, the way we play here will mirror the way the Islanders play there. Scott and I will be in constant communication. From day to day, he’ll have complete evaluations of our players at the American League level.
“I coached against Scotty Gordon a lot. The fans will like his style of play. His teams have always been very structured, but they play up-up tempo, an in-your-face speed game. His teams have always competed hard.
“This is a big responsibility for our staff. The kids are going to make some mistakes, that we know. The key is to make sure they don’t make the same ones time after time. I don’t want to get into specifics of each kid right now. Let them have their fair chance of being evaluated by the Islanders. We can get into that another day. I’m just really looking forward to it the season and the challenge.
“When I played at the University of Maine I had Shawn Walsh, one of the all-time greats, as my head coach. Shawn out-worked every coach. His work ethic was unbelievable. If we lost a game, it wasn’t because we were unprepared. But the best thing about Shawn was that he knew how to deal with all the different personalities and still get the best out of every player. That’s the kind of coach I strive to be.”
7 Responses to “VOICES: JACK CAPUANO
Bridgeport coach on being in sync with Gordon”
Please Wait
Great! The key to building a winning organization is to first to develop the kids that you do have but also, to have the same style of play in the minors as you do with the big club so when a player is called up, he won’t miss a beat. The Devils were great at this with their farm club. When the lost a player, someone came up and it was like interchangeable parts. Devils lose Holik and Madden was right there to fill the void…Devils lost Guerin and Shanahan and they had Sykora and Rolston right there to fill that void..Sykora is gone, Elias stepped right in, Rolston goes and its Gionta…Nydemyer leaves, Rafalski was there..etc etc. Its why they’ve been so great since 1994. The Isles are on the right step to success, they can’t waver from it.
Mr Botta,
Let’s also tell the entire story here, Ted Nolan reportedly traveled to Bridgeport several times his first season on days off and was the one who felt Blake Comeau had the best overall NHL potential two-way ability and felt his game was better suited to the NHL than the AHL.
Bergenheim was in Europe at that time so technically speaking until Frans Nielsen or Jeremy Colliton prove that incorrect, let’s give Ted Nolan’s judgement it’s due.
Jack Capuano based on how he played Dustin Kohn also seemed to feel the same by his actions.
Ted Nolan did travel to Albany during his second season to check on Brandon Nolan after his concussion but also it has to be said after the Washington game in December this team did not have three days off in a row almost the rest of the season with that schedule that saw them play three games in about twenty days.
Nolan himself also got sick for a short time last year with some problems he had with the building he moved into according to another article.
All it takes is one phone call a week, to keep updated. I now have to believe that he wasn’t going to use Bridgeport if he did not have to.
I also think that because he was not being offered a contract extension before his final year also led to his passiveness towards the organization.
In all honesty Nolan is the past…move on. We know Capuano will be in constant communication with Gordon, and that’s what counts.
Stop making excuse for Nolan. All Nolan cared about was himself. What a surprise not one single team went any where near him when he became available. Please with he had problems with his building, that’s comical.
Both Nolan and Snow put on a terrible show. They sat on a stage together and lied to everyone. As Mr Botta wrote they both share the blame in their conduct.
As for the part about Nolan he got sick in the building he was living in for a short time because of mold or something and it lingered which was in a Long Island paper with his wife’s comments.
I tried to answer to why he was not in Bridgeport as he was during his first season, after early Decmeber his club was virtually never off.
Just because someone leaves does not make them a bad person or wrong, in this case both Garth Snow and Ted Nolan handled things very poorly.
Thank You
This is good to read, good to hear. It sounds like we finally have a foundation to build up from. Nolan did zippo for the team, nuff said! lets move on from the past look toward a better futre, this is not going to happen overnight, it may take a season or two before some fans see what they want to see..a run for the “cup”
If what’s being said here comes to pass and the coaches and players do their thing we should see some promising hockey being played, skill, speed, better defense, goals..etc) fingers crossed!
Thank you for reporting the facts and then moving on to whats important- the present and the future. This was very interesting.