This is gold.
Less than 48 hours before John Tortorella was hired to coach the Columbus Blue Jackets, right around the time reports surfaced that he had been contacted to replace Todd Richards, the coach broke down in detail the Blue Jackets’ issues on the ice and gave some advice to Richards.
(Tortorella says his hiring process started Tuesday night, after Columbus’s seventh straight loss.)
“That’s a well-coached team. We saw that. And they have some good, young kids. I think there’s some work to be done at the back end, the blue line,” Tortorella said on TV Monday night.
“It’s fixable. It’s not too late here. It’s not about pushing a panic button,” he went on. “I think they’re going to get out of it. It looks ugly right now, but I do think they’re well-coached, they have the people there, but they just have to worry about one thing: keep their game simple and just concentrate on the battles.”
Eager to get back into the game while still cashing cheques from the Vancouver Canucks, Tortorella took two jobs this fall: head coach of Team USA at the 2016 World Cup and analyst for NHL Tonight in the States.
In that television role, Tortorella spoke Monday at length following the Jackets’ sixth loss, using video examples to break down the winless Jackets’ problems. Watch Torts’ analysis, starting at the two-minute mark here:
Some quick points Tortorella addresses as he breaks down plays against the Toronto Maple Leafs and Buffalo Sabres:
- Tortorella’s advice to Richards: “Just turn down the noise. Don’t even listen to it. It’s usually pundits like us that really don’t really know what’s going on in that locker room…. He’ll handle it the right way. Ignore the noise and concentrate on your team.”
- Columbus is losing little puck battles, especially in neutral ice, what he calls “the most important zone in hockey.”
- Brandon “Doobie” Dubinsky, whom Tortorella coached with the New York Rangers, gets pointed out for a couple mistakes, but the coach goes easy on him: “He’s trying.”
- In the defensive zone, Columbus needs to safely protect the puck instead of trying to create something out of nothing.
- He refers to the Blue Jackets as “we” multiple times. A figure of speech, but interesting nonetheless.
- Finishing last season 15-1-1 in games that weren’t meaningful raised harmful expectations.
- “It’s amazing that these athletes that you think are so strong mentally are fragile, and they’re fragile as a group right now,” Tortorella said. “Stay together.”
- Winning neutral-zone battles can swing momentum significantly.
- Columbus will learn from this losing streak and become a better team because of it: “So lay off ’em.”
“I’ve always been impressed by how they played,” Tortorella said at his introductory press conference Wednesday. “You’re looking to win. It’s a team that’s there.”
