CALGARY — With head coaching gigs popping up around the NHL, Dave Lowry will be keeping his phone close by.
Lowry, who has been the bench boss for the Victoria Royals for the last three seasons, earned his second Western Hockey League coach of the year award on Wednesday after leading his club to a league-best 50-16-6 record.
Prior to taking over the Royals in 2012, the 51-year-old Ottawa native spent three years as Brent Sutter’s assistant with the Calgary Flames, who are one of the NHL teams with a coaching vacancy after letting go of Bob Hartley on Tuesday.
Lowry says he’s hoping Flames general manager Brad Treliving might make a phone call about a return to Calgary.
"Hopefully at some point there is contact," said Lowry after receiving the Dunc McCallum Memorial Trophy. "I know right now there’s lots of great opportunities that are out there."
Lowry’s roots to the city of Calgary go back to 2000. He spent the final four years of his playing career with the Flames and then joined the WHL’s Calgary Hitmen as an assistant coach in 2005 before taking over head coaching duties in 2008 for one season. As the Hitmen’s head coach, Lowry made the league finals and went on to join Sutter with the Flames the following year.
"There’s 30 jobs in the National Hockey League. Obviously if you have an opportunity to talk about (Calgary), that would be something that would be very interesting," said Lowry.
Lowry has 11 years of coaching between the WHL and NHL on his resume, and was Canada’s head coach at the 2016 world junior hockey championships in Helsinki, Finland. He believes that if given the opportunity, he’s ready to jump to the next level.
"I don’t see why there isn’t any reason (not to be ready)," said Lowry. "I think you look at what you’re doing and you look at similarities. The style of play is not going to change. We learn from the National Hockey League. You look at systems that teams play and you look at preparation, there’s no difference. I think the only thing is now you’re dealing with adults instead of kids.
"The big thing is in the Western Hockey League there might be more to manage away from the rink than there is at the National Hockey League."
Lowry won his first WHL coach of the year honours in 2013-14. This year’s award came after Victoria won its first Scotty Munro Memorial Trophy as the league’s top team for the first time in franchise history.
"I think it’s a tremendous honour," Lowry said about the award.
Lowry played 1,084 games over 19 NHL seasons with the Vancouver Canucks, St. Louis Blues, Florida Panthers, San Jose Sharks and Calgary.
