Lindy Ruff introduced as the Sabres 'new' head coach

Well, I know you guys aren't clapping for me. Um I'm just gonna get us started with a few housekeeping notes here. Um Thank you all so much for coming. We're very excited to welcome Lindy Ruff as our new head coach. Um We will start off with remarks from Terry Pula, followed by remarks from both Kevin and Lindy. And then Kevin and Lindy will be available for questions here at the table. If you have a question, Chris uh Mitch and Kelsey all have microphones, so please make sure to use that and then um at the end, we will bring everybody up for a photo op. So if you need any photos, that will be the time um with that. Thank you guys again. I'm excited to welcome Mr Pula. Thank you Nicole. First thing I'd like to do is uh thank Donny Granado, Jason Christie and Matt Smith for their tenure with the Sabers. Uh Donnie told me, I'm sorry that I let you, Kevin, our fans and our players down that goes to show you what kind of guy Donnie is. Uh, he has left the Sabers in a better place and we appreciate that we're here to talk about the future, but I do want to mention the past Kevin Adams and Lindy Ruff are two men prominent in Saber's history. They both lost their jobs as coaches with the Sabers which connects them in that manner. One has a Stanley Cup ring, one without Lindy, the man without the ring and most Sabers fans eyes is probably a scape blade on a line away from winning a cup and then went on to coach that team that tore his heart out in the Stanley Cup final afterwards. Um, that had to be hard to do. And how about the rash of defensive injuries that the Sabers team incurred late in the playoffs that cost us possibly cost Lindy possibly a second ring for all we know and the team that beat him in those playoffs, that's Kevin's ring. Lindy has coached three different teams to 50 wins or more in the National Hockey League. There are four coaches all time who have done that and Lindy's one of them, New Jersey won 27 games one year and 52. The next was a young team. The Sabers back in the day when he was here. His first stint went from 37 wins one year to 52 and 53. The two years following what I'm trying to get at here is the line between winning and losing in the national hockey league is a fine line. Some guys have cups because they got lucky. Some guys have cups because they were good. Some don't have cups because the brakes didn't go their way. Lindy President's trophy with the Sabers Jack Adams Award. 571 franchise victories with the Sabers second most in the league all time to Al Harbor when he was released his last time here as our head coach, he had participated in 54% of Sabers games all time. Most importantly, Lindy knows how to win and he knows how to take a team to another level. He may be the most competitive person I've ever met in my life. Just go fishing with them and you may not ever go fishing with them again. He's also not going to ask anyone to do something that he wouldn't do himself. So I welcome Lindy as our next head coach and uh Kevin Adams is gonna come up and say a word. Well, I agree with everything Terry said, except when he's talking about the 06 team for obvious reasons. Um Terry, thank you for that. I want to thank Laura for being here and the entire Pula family. And a week ago, I outlined exactly the criteria that I was going to look for. Um As we began the search for the ne next head coach, I, I met with players individually in exit meetings. Uh I met with the team um entirely as a group I met with smaller groups over a couple days and coming out of those meetings felt even stronger about what we needed to bring in. And that was an experienced head coach, someone with a track record of success pedigree, someone that could stand up in front of our group and take them to the next level as Terry mentioned and began the process of talking to many different candidates that check those boxes. It's been an exhausting week working around the clock and with each conversation I had and there were many, I kept coming back to another conversation with Lindy and feeling stronger, hour by hour that this was the man who is right to step into this role and become the next head coach of the Buffalo Sabers. And I want to make one thing very clear. It is tremendous that Lindy has a long storied history in the Buffalo Savers organization. It's terrific that he is connected to the city of Buffalo in the Western New York community, but that's really just an added bonus. He's the right person for this job. And I truly believe that he is the person that's going to take us to the next level. Our players are craving it. We're excited about it and the hard work begins now. So I want to reintroduce the next head coach of the Buffalo Sabers, Lindy Ruff. Uh welcome everybody. Uh The first thing I'd like to do is is thank uh Terry Paulla and family and Kevin Adams uh for entrusting me with getting the Sabers to that next level. Uh I'm super excited to be given the opportunity as Kevin said, the, the team is about now, um, it's about taking a young group that has developed over the years, have gotten himself within, I believe at this time, last year, one point of being in the playoffs, a team that has a tremendous amount of talent, it will be my opportunity to put these guys in the right position, use their strengths to get them to that next level. Part of that will be commitment on their part. Part of that will be the connection that we're going to develop from a coaching staff, from a management to coaching to players that we're gonna be, we're gonna be committed from day one, we're going to be connected. This is if you're going to be a successful hockey club, now there's got to be alignment between players, coaches and an understanding of how we need to play. And the last part of that is being consistent with that play night in night out. The next part is the players are in a position now where they can ask more of each other, they know where they've been, they know where they got to get to, they know what they need to expect of each other. Here's what I want from him. I want them to love playing here. I want them to love playing for each other. And I want them to love being a Buffalo Saber for Saber fans that I think are some of the greatest in the league. How are we gonna get there? We're gonna have to earn it from day one. The work is going to have to start now. We're going to have to earn it. We're going to have to step on the ice when the seasons start and earn the respect of everybody and get to that next level. But again, I'll just say that really excited. I am humbled by the opportunity to be standing here right now. And it was a decision when Kevin first contacted me, I didn't say yes right away. We had a lot of discussions and just understanding with all these conversations, the discipline that's gonna have to go into getting us to that place and discipline is for players is you have to do the right thing at the right time, do the right thing at the right time, whether that's training this summer, uh coming to camp, being, knowing that each day you're gonna have to become a better player and knowing that you're gonna get pushed to a level that will make us achieve the goal we want to achieve. And that is getting to the next level. So I just want to thank you all and I'm just going to reiterate again, super excited and I might just add this, I've missed like I've missed Paul Hamilton and Mike Harrington and that's the reason I'm back. Muzzle. Well, after that, I guess I have to start. Right. Lindy. Welcome back. First of all. Thank you. A bit of a surreal moment for all of us. Probably tell me this, you know, Terry referenced the 54% of games you played in, in your career here before you left. Um, you won a lot of games as a coach and a player. This franchise was a winning franchise for the 1st 40 years of its existence. Obviously, things have turned. Now you had a lot of teams here that expected to win. Now, this team is trying to hope to win. How do you help transform the culture of a losing organization? Sort of what you had to do in Dallas and New Jersey? What are the biggest things you can do early on to just transform the, the attitude completely with this club? Um It's a great question, Mike. Um that is not easy. Um You, you transform the attitude of any of the club by having each player believe in what their strength is, what they can, what they can bring on a nightly basis, the level of compete that they can bring. And then at the end of the night, you got to win hockey games and when you win hockey games, that belief really becomes contagious. You, you like how you play and you push your teammates to a higher level and you have to win. Wendy. Congrats on being back. Thank you, Paul. You look at what you had. I remember you had a group of guys that came up together, Miller Roy Harville, the whole group, Bannock. And here you come into Buffalo. And if you've got kind of the same situation, you have a very group of young guys who are all coming up together. How much different is it now than maybe when you dealt with Vanek or dealt with Derek Roy or, or something like that? And the second question is it wouldn't be a press conference with me and Mike unless we ask you who your goaltender is. I've got it down to three letters upl. Um You know, a real good question and, you know, you mentioned some names I had uh three of those names you mentioned, reached out to me, uh Jason Palmer, Ryan Miller, Thomas Vanek. Um and they all said you're the guy that can get him there. Congrats. Uh And I think if you remember, I was pretty hard on like a Thomas Vanek, Thomas Vanek and I have had lots of great conversations, um you know, about plan days and, and, you know, Jason Palmer, we actually waved him and sent him down just before he became the player. He was. So this, this team is so similar to where we were at back then, um deep with talent just we needed to play the game the right way and, and again, I'm going to reference the discipline in the game. Not all players are going to be the same, not, not all players are going to be, but understanding your role inside the team and executing your role will help the team win. Um We were deep like 34 lines deep, we were three lines deep and, and then I had a, you know, two or three really good useful tools that we could lean on people with um from, you know, Rob Ray Andrew Peters and Adam Mayer guys like that. Um So when I look at the, the level of skill on the team and, and that group that we went in 05 or six, it, it reminds me a lot. Um This team actually reminds me a lot of the previous team. I just came from a lot of really good talented players, Lenny John Worrell. Welcome back. Thanks John. Um It's one thing to go to Jersey. It's one thing to go to Dallas. Uh but given your background and knowing how difficult or how, I guess how, how much this franchise has endured for 13 years and 11 years since your departure, how much is this personal to turn this franchise around knowing that it's Buffalo? Well, I mean, there is some personal there for sure. It um you know, obviously I've lived in the city and I've owned a house in this city since 1979. So I think I understand from my playing days to my coaching days, um, you know, what a successful team and, and how, how great the city is when you have a successful hockey club. Um, and really enjoyed all that time, enjoyed the time as a player and enjoyed the time as a coach. And, um, it would mean a lot to have this group of players experience what I was able to experience as a, as a player and as a coach that this building shook in some of the playoff series that involved with, I can still remember the eight nothing Philadelphia win and, and sitting in the office and thinking that the building is shaking. It's incredible. Um So my goal is to have these guys, this group experience, what I was able to experience. Welcome back, Alex Barsky with TV Daily News. You've made other stops since your first stint here. But what would you say has changed about Lindy Ruff? The coach since your first stint here in Buffalo, the game has changed so much. Lindy Ruff has changed so much. Uh, um I've been around some great coaches from World Championships. I've gone to, to the Olympics in Russia and traded ideas with, you know, some of the best coaches in the league was able and fortunate enough to, uh to win, to be part of the coaching staff that won the gold medal in Sochi and to win it in a fashion where they said that Canada won't be able to play in the big ice, they won't be good enough defensively. And as a staff, we put together a plan that we were the best defensive team there, we were the best team and with highly skilled players. So when you look at a group like we have here, highly skilled players, you can execute that highly skilled part of the game. You can use it for offense, you can use it for defense. Uh But you have to have the discipline inside the game to do the right thing at the right time. And, uh, sometimes that's puck decisions. Sometimes it's, well, maybe we don't need one more goal at this time that we, we may be able to win this game. Two, nothing and not put a lot of risk in our game. So, um, my coaching style from when I left here, I actually laugh at some of my coaching style, uh because a lot of things have changed. Um And, but I won't go into a lot of detail, but I'm a lot better coach now than I was when I left Lindy Lance Lyski from the Buffalo News. Uh, you mentioned that you had several questions for Kevin when he first contacted you. I was wondering if you would be able to explain sort of the back and forth about the conversations that that made you consider this opportunity. And what about the personnel, the roster really intrigued you about coming back here. Well, first about the roster again, I'll just reiterate that the team does remind me a lot of, you know, coming out of the lockout in 506 and a lot of similarities, um, the conversations with, with Kevin were, you know, just coming off of being let go in New Jersey and, you know, seeing a coach get let go here. And, um, I just, I was questioning myself, you know, why would I do this? Then I came to a point, why wouldn't I, because I'm a risk taker? And I think if there's no risk, there's no reward. So I'm putting myself in that position. Uh, I have a question for Kevin. Kevin, can you take us through your timeline? Was Lindy at the top of your list? Was, was he your first choice? And how many people did you speak to? Yeah, I mean, I think I said to you all last week at the press conference that it was going to go to work immediately walking out of there, which I did. And certainly when I laid out, uh, what I was looking for, um, you start making a list and obviously Lindy is someone that checked those boxes and was on that list and there were others and I spoke to double digit uh, candidates. And, um, but I also, as I mentioned, I really appreciated those, those conversations, but as I was going through it and some of these were late night phone calls. Some of these were very early morning. This was around the clock for a week straight. I just kept coming back to the conversations with Lindy and as he started to dig in even more to our team and the opportunity that he saw and the potential he saw in this group. I mean, Lindy Ruff would not be sitting up here if he did not believe this team could win. That's why he's here. He's here to win. The past is the past. That's great. But this is about now, this is about the players in that locker room. Now, this is about the fans that come in here and can believe in something great. That's why he's sitting here and that's what I saw and I felt as I had those conversations. So, um there was a lot of, lot of really highly qualified candidates but every hour that went by, it felt I felt more and more strongly. And after, you know, in depth conversations with Terry, this is our guy. Hi, Lindy Mapo with channel seven in Buffalo. Congratulations over here. Um Probably to your right. Yeah, one of the themes last week when we were in the locker room for locker room clean out less than a week ago was accountability and that these players want to be held accountable to you. What does accountability mean, accountability to mean starts with the player himself? That the first thing he does is holds himself accountable. That did, did I do enough to get this team to where it needed to go before you can be accountable or look for accountability from somebody else. You got to be accountable to yourself. Whether it's your training in the summertime, whether it's your preparation for camp, whether we get to game one? Are you ready to play? You? You hold yourself accountable. The next level of accountability when you become a good team is the players themselves will hold each other accountable. They will say that you know that play wasn't good enough. You need to get, you need to be there, you need to be on the wall, you need to block that shot for me. Uh That's a game changer. The last part of it is the coach who just can't yell and scream at players anymore. You can't just say you got to do this. You got to do that. You don't play. This will be the way we, we grow is believing in the way we play. If we don't play like that, my biggest tool is to take ice time away. My greatest tool is you're playing really well, you get more ice time, you're going to be that guy. I'm going to count on. You're going to take that key face off. You're going to be on there in the last minute, you're going to be on for every empty net. And I believe that your best player should be on the ice at all. Key moments that your top players should be the guys that lead the way that first they're accountable to themselves first. Uh, you know, accountability is a big word and accountability starts with each player taking a look in the mirror. Hi, Lindy, uh, Joe Yard with Bleacher report here. Uh, congratulations, welcome back. Thank you. Um, you have a, you have a pretty full staff of assistant coaches here. Are you looking to add to that? And do you have a process that you're looking to, to get to do that? It really just starting to get into that. Uh, I actually sat with the coaches this morning, the coaches that are here, you know, what seemed like a couple of hours when you sit down and start talking to coaches about players and team and how the season went. Uh, but yeah, the question is looking to add for sure. Um, looking to get all the pieces in the right place would be my, my second part that will make us one of the best staffs. Hi, Lindy Rachel H Meyer, uh Spectrum News over here. Hi. Um, curious as a follow up to Lance's question more about the last few months you've had since parting ways with New Jersey. Was your next coaching opportunity on your mind? Were you fee for something like this or did it more so, just fall in your lap, you know, when you let go, you don't, you have a period of time where you don't know what you're going to do. But I think there's an understanding that I've gone, I've gone to a lot of different places to keep coaching. I've been a life coach. I, I probably did what no other coach would do is be let go from a team and then take an assistant coaching job somewhere else and, and part of that was to continue to grow. I love the game. Um, I don't know, might be a disease. I'm, as Terry said, I'm highly competitive, I'm competitive in whatever you want to do. Um And I think the players will understand that we'll have a lot of fun with the compete, um, inside the game, outside the game in the locker room. Um, because if you love competing, you can compete in a lot of areas. So, you know, initially, yeah, I was thinking, yeah, probably if the right opportunity came, I'd get back into coaching again, Lindy Jason Moser Buffalo Hockey. Now as part of the large contingent that grew up in the Buffalo area. I've had a lot of family and friends asked me to say hi. So, first of all, hi. Second of all, uh, what do you say to these fans that are yearning for a playoff team? It's been a long time. The only thing we can say is when we, when we hit camp, we're going to prove that we're gonna, we're gonna get to the next level. I did my point about, you know, you gotta love playing the game, you gotta love the teammates, gotta love playing for each other. And then the last part when you're winning hockey games, you love playing for your fans, you love playing for the city because they get in behind you and they push you and they motivate you and it's, it's just an extra source of motivation. There's a lot of pressure inside the game. There's a lot of pressure outside the game. There's media pressure, there's family, there's friends, there's um there's a lot of, so the players have to enjoy being part of the group in, in and they've got to enjoy the winds. They've got to enjoy the great moments inside the game, whether that's blocking a shot, a big penalty kill. It's not always about scoring goals. It might be a big hit, it might be a great back check. There's a lot of different things, but what, what I say to the fans is we got to go out and win hockey games. We gotta, we gotta get to that next level. Hi, Coach Sarah Holland with channel four here in Buffalo. Congrats again on returning back to Buffalo. We heard from a lot of guys in locker clean out just past the last week that they, they would be excited to have you as the next head coach, Alex Tuck comes to mind said it would be a dream come true to have you here. What is that like? Knowing that prior to becoming head coach, you just had full support from some of the players here. He might say after the first week who I was wrong on that one, I, I think they're gonna, and, uh it, it's great. I mean, obviously, um we all want to win. Um and this is a we thing, this is really what I'm going to emphasize, this will be, this will be a coaching staff. We think we will have to be successful, we have to earn the players respect and this is how we're going to play. And this is the, the level of accountability will hold you to um knowing that if, if we're going to be the team that we want to be, this is the way we have to play the game and this is, this is, this is the way we're going to operate from day one, moving forward. I mean, you were on Lindy's coaching staff. How much did you draw on that when you were thinking about this and deciding, you know, you've been in coaching meetings and that type of thing with them. How much did you draw on that experience? Yeah, I played a role, uh you know, I spent four years uh as part of Lindy's staff, you know, two years as a player development um role where I was, I was in with him and doing more on the skill side. And then two years as an assistant coach. So that's four years of learning of seeing Lindy Day in and day out the way he leads the way that he um challenges the players to be the best version of ourselves, but also cares about him. And that to me is one of the most important parts now, um is the modern day coach, is building relationships but being able to also be firm and hard when you need to. And then also the, one of the things that, that I learned, you know, in my time with Lindy was that he was very good with non negotiables within a system. You know, we're going to agree about it. We're going to talk about it, Lindy, the coaches, the players are going to talk about it, but when we agree, then we're, we're doing that and we're going to hold you to it. So those are some of the things that, of course, as I went through the process and talked to different candidates, I had that, you know, that trust in that relationship. It, it matters. But that isn't the reason, you know, ultimately as I went through it because there's tremendous amount of, um, coaching candidates out there. It just for me, came back to this is the right coach for this team to win and to win now. And that's our goal, you know, to win hockey games. That's, that's what matters. And the, the US knowing each other and the trust and going back to those years, that's great, but it's not really about that. It's about winning. Hey Lindy Adam Benini. Welcome back. Congratulations. Um I wanted to touch on something that Kevin just said we had talked about it in the news conference last week, that balance he just talked about between hard nosed kind of accountability and the modern approach to coaching. One of the last conversations you and I had in 2013 prior to you leaving was you were working to kind of evolve to that. Um Take me through whether it was an assistant with New York or maybe your time in Dallas or in New Jersey, how have those experiences impacted that evolution to making you the coach you are now as you return? Well, I think setting off first leaving in and having a new group to work with and knowing that when I left, I, I really felt that where I was at my coaching career wasn't good enough. Uh So when I left for Dallas, it was, I needed to change some stuff. I didn't, I felt like I didn't need to go in the dressing room after every game. I didn't need to go in and critique the players on, you know, whether it was a loss and kind of let the dust settle, got to Dallas and, and really decided I'm gonna change from this. I wanna be, I wanna be a guy that can communicate really well with the players. I want, I want to be able to get along, be demanding but be fair. And I think that that's the part that's most, most important and the part that they're going to respect the most is expect a lot, be consistent with your messages, message. Um The ability for me to let games go. I thought, you know, let it go, let it go, you know, um move on to the next game, uh was an area that I thought I had to get better at. Uh and I think really going to New York as an assistant and just, you know, not a lot of pressure and no media didn't have to really talk to anybody. I get uh to work the extra players, I get to spend extra time, um just stay current with, with players. Um You know, I'll give you one example of, I won't mention the player, but I had a player, I wanted to get an autograph from him. I asked him for the autograph and autographed it and uh it looked like, you know, just sort of kindergarten writing and, and I said, you know, could you do that and like cursive and then he goes coach. We don't, we don't, they don't, we use digital stuff now. We don't, we don't use cursive anymore. So I had to live with it. What that, what that autograph looked like. And actually the person I gave it to thought I did it. I said no, I didn't do it. But it, it's an example. It's like calling a player now. And uh voicemail with the person you've reached does not have voicemail set up. Well, you text now all the time. Um and actually texting has a useful purpose for me because it's easier to trade. I want a player to text me. I don't mind that. I, I'll trade conversations. It's easier. It's what, it's what young kids do now, Lindy, it's Lan in the Buffalo News. Again, curious that in New Jersey, obviously it was also a younger team. What was the key to getting younger players to understand and fill specific roles on it in a group? And what role did that play? Do you think in the success that you guys had last season specifically? Well, again, you look at, you know, where we came from where we ended up last season. Um, are you talking this season or the previous season? Yeah. Well, I mean, we had a heck of a year a year ago, um, and it was just the right time for that group. I, I might be sitting here being one of the luckiest coaches because this might be the right time where all these guys just take that next step that they, they understand that if we get a little bit better in this area, let's say our, our face off percentage gets a little bit better and we have the puck a little bit more. Um, we're a little bit more willing to get inside shot lanes and a few, few more pucks don't get to the net. Those, all those little one and two percenters made a huge difference. That as a coaching staff there, the, the simplest stuff keeps adding up. Stick on puck, stick on, puck, put the stick in the ice, stick on Puck. Don't let him make that play, turn your feet sideways. Uh Come back to your own end and stop which every kid is taught from day one. Just these are all a bunch of just little one percenters that just kept adding up. And in Jersey it led to, we had a really good training camp. I'll just reference a year ago, we lost the first two games of the year which were disappointing. Then we won, I think 13 straight. Um And when you do that and you remain consistent and we remain consistent really throughout the year. Um We became a good team, Rick. Uh Welcome back. You mentioned your, your passion, uh is almost a, a sickness. I'm curious, how much coaching do you feel like you have left in you? I take it one day at a time. So I got one more day. Um Now I just, I love the game. That's really all I can tell you. I've, I get asked that every time I go somewhere or leave somewhere. Well, how much more, how long? I don't know. I, I'm just gonna keep coaching. It's what I've done my whole life. It's what Adam Benini has done it all. He's a sportscaster. How much longer, Adam? Hey, uh, Lindy Mike Catalana from, whm. In Rochester. Your last time here you had a lot of players who had, had big experience in the A HL and in the playoffs and moving forward, leading into the NHL. I know you got a lot going on right now. But how much will you be keeping an eye on that? What those guys are doing down there for their future experience to come up and be part of your team in Buffalo? They'll be keeping a real sharp eye on that. I mean, usually the strength of any club is their, is their parent farm club and the, and the, the kids that are being developed down there and have come up and you just go back to the history here when I was around. That's where all they all came from. The VIC, the Palmen Bills. They all came from that system. Uh Lindy, uh Hi, welcome back, Dave Reichert from uh NBC News Radio. I just wanted to, first of all, welcome you back. But secondly, ask you with the similarities between this team and the team, you just came from the Devils. Have you thought about style play? I know you have a lot of uh young fast players, uh offensive players as you did on that team, the style of play will try to play a real fast game. Um Use your, use your speed, use your talent, every player has something to offer in a different skill set, but use that skill set to make us the best offensive team. Uh We really had a team that had defense that were involved in the play to help create offense. And again, uh that will be a big part of it, but use that skill and use that speed to be a good defensive player too. Thank you, Chris spoke to Novich Fort Erie observer. Uh a passionate hockey team committed to winning doesn't happen in a vacuum. How do you feel about the role of the Buffalo fans in turning this big ship around? Maybe it's a great question again, I think it, it falls on our group to get this to the next level. And as Kevin said, the time is now, it's now. Um so you can reference them. There's been a lot of really good hockey games out of this club, whether it's uh this year last year, I think the part that has to go one level higher is just consistency and our fans will be back. They're great fans. Part of the evolution of uh the NHL these days is the implementation of analytics into uh the hockey world. Uh How do you use those numbers? Um when you apply it to coaching. Um I love analytics. We are a huge analytics club in, in New Jersey. Um There's a fine line, sometimes there's an eye test that goes along with analytics when we're, I won't get into too deep, too deep. But I, I think when you look at some of the better teams and you look at where there are, even if you're just using expected goals and expected goals against, um you know, whether you want to use entries or denied entries or you know, for how you're playing and how are you creating opportunities or, or how are you giving up opportunities? Um Part of that analytics is really good for maybe saying this player here when you look at analytics should, you know, maybe should not be playing with this other player. The numbers are there that support boy, that's a, you guys have terrible results when the, when these two players are together or when these two players and somebody else is on the ice. It's a tool. Um It's a tool I like to use, but I also like to pass the eye test at the same time, Lindy Rachel Hot Meyer again, spectrum news. Um without obviously all the analytics and tools in front of you, you've said this is a ta a roster loaded with talent. I'm curious what excites you the most about what's been developed here so far, Paul, I think that every team needs, every team needs a goaltender and I think there's, there's a couple of really talented goaltenders that are working their way up here. Um, and goaltending is probably the number one thing that every club needs. Um, the second most important thing is usually defense, you can have highly skilled forwards, you can be a good offensive. But if you can't keep the puck out of your net or you don't have people that can move the puck or make that first pass, uh, help you exit the zone in a hurry, then your good offensive players don't get the puck enough. So I would start with goaltending and then I would start with a defense that I think is really good. Lindy, you mentioned defense, um, over here in front of you, you mentioned defense and how you want them to play aggressively. I mean, this is a pretty deep defense core. What, what stands out about the blue line to you when you, you know, you, you first kind of glance at it again, just the, the talent level, the puck moving ability, the ability to skate, which is part, really part of today's game. When you look at some of the good teams that have recently won, they've got one or two guys in that back end that are highly skilled and involved with all parts of the game, whether it's defending, whether it's offense. And I mean, you know, I can probably go to Dolene is the guy that you look at and you marvel at the way he plays Kevin. Um You were very collaborative with Don Granado in terms of laying the foundation here. How much input do you expect Lindy to have on the roster? And, and how aggressively do you think you guys might spend this summer? Well, I think, you know, just no decisions made in a vacuum. I've said that multiple times and it's my style, first of all, to surround myself with people that are um really challenging me and, and I always talk to our staff about, it's not about being right, it's about getting it right. So we need to get it right. And for sure, like every decision um that when you're talking about the roster, you're going to debate and Lindy is going to have, um, you know, big voice in that because you need to be on the same page. Absolutely. That's a big part of it. And, you know, we'll have those discussions now, you know, and that's part of the reason when I got to the point where felt strongly and I went to Terry and said, believe this is the right decision. The reason I was ready to move was because the works now and, you know, training camp in September isn't when we start. And that was the message to the players in the exit exit meetings that it's now and it's, this is part of it. So the work that we have to do and with the other coaches and it's, it's, it's all part of it. So, um, in terms of spending it, you know, people get really focused on that. I am, my position have been given every single resource to make this team the best it can be. For me, it's about winning so we will do whatever it takes to win. Um It's not, I don't think about the spending part. Sometimes that goes hand in hand and how you build a roster and you have to be disciplined. And obviously when you have a young team and you're getting a core together, you're projecting contracts and signing extensions, all those things matter, but this is about winning. Lindy. You've talked about evolution of your own career. I want to hear a little about this season. I mean, you'd never would have imagined you'd be here in October. You were coming up 100 12 point season. Um It's well documented what happened in New Jersey with injuries and goaltending, which largely leads you to being here today. What do you think you take away from that in terms of just, you know, how fickle the game can be and how you just have to battle through things even as a coach at your age, what can you learn from a season like that? That goes completely off the rails? Yeah, you, I mean, it's a great question, you know, I think I've, I've drilled down into that season quite a bit already where it, we had, we faced a lot of adversity with, you know, first of all, we, at one point lost Hughes and Heer at the same time, uh, you lose Dougie Hamilton for the year. Um, 2 to 2 of our veteran defenseman, uh went the free agent route, uh where we knew we were going to have to try to develop, you know, Luke Hughes and a Simone Anemic and we had three young defenseman with Kevin Ball, um which I think, you know, that you're, you're stepping back. Uh, we lost, we lost some players that, you know, I think hurt us. Um, even through the injuries, we were, you know, we were hanging around 500 a couple of games over five, I think at 1.56 games. Um and at the end, you know, I think our goaltending was, it was good at times, sometimes it struggled but we couldn't, you know, we couldn't maintain that level. So it was, it was trying to find a way to win hockey games a different way. A lot of nights. Um, you know, we didn't win enough. I mean, we, I can look the second last game before I was, I was let go. We, we outshot Anaheim, I think 55 to 23. Um Jack Hughes was given a penalty shot or I chose Jack with the guy pushing the net off for two seconds and when Jack went down and, and stick handled and didn't even get a shot away. I kind of said to myself, I don't know if this is my year. Um, but we did, we faced a lot of adversity that we didn't, we weren't able to overcome and that number of injuries and that number of changes, I think, you know, we knew that we were going to have a couple of young defenseman in, but when Dougie Hamilton went out for the year that, that added another young defenseman. Um, so we, we lost some pieces, Mike that were really important. Um, but that's still, that's still a good hockey club. Kevin. If I overhear Kevin, if I might ask, uh, how I know this process moved very quickly. How many candidates did you speak with? And how quickly did it just circle back that Lindy was the guy? Well, you know, I think it's in fairness to who I spoke to. Certainly don't want to talk about specific individuals, names. I can tell you double digits. Um, and don't take the fact that we're here a week later that we didn't go through an extensive process. I can tell you that it has been some long days, um, detailed conversations and as I mentioned, II, I can't say that it was like, I don't remember the moment, but with each conversation and the times going back to Lindy and at times, um, him calling me back and just us going through over and over and it just, it's, it snowballed into the point where um I wanted to for sure, make sure that I wasn't missing something and do my due diligence. That's my job. I have to be able to stand in front of our team and I have to be able to sit up here confidently feeling that I did due diligence and this is the right person. So what I said last week, I couldn't tell you how long it was going to be. But when I felt confident to recommend that this is who should be the next head coach of the Buffalo Sabers to Terry, that that's what would happen and here we are. So, um he's the right person. Hi, Lindy Mave again from WKBW. Kevin mentions pretty often that he wants guys who want to be Sabers in your opening introduction. You echoed something similar. You echoed getting drafted in 1979 by, by this organization. Can you put into words what the Buffalo Sabers mean to you? Well, I mean, obviously I'm and I'll say this again. I'm humbled by the, the opportunity I'm getting because I get a chance to do something that I wasn't able to do as a player. Um Then I became the coach of the team and didn't succeed what I was set out to do. And now I'm getting one more opportunity, which I really feel I'm blessed to have that opportunity