Ch-ch-changes in Kamloops

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor
The Kamloops Blazers’ dressing room is busier than a bus depot these days.
Guy Charron was introduced Monday as the WHL team’s new head coach -- the team’s third head coach this season is signed to a deal that covers the rest of this season -- and later ran his first practice at Interior Savings Centre.
“I thought the players, for the first practice, responded very well,” Charron said, adding that “I know I’m getting the support of” assistant coaches Scott Ferguson and Geoff Smith.
Ferguson had been the interim head coach since general manager Craig Bonner fired Barry Smith on Oct. 26. At that point, the Blazers, who are at home to the Kootenay Ice on Friday, were 8-7-2-0; they have gone 3-6-0-1 since the coaching change.
“It’s not going to be The Guy Charron Show here,” said Charron, a 60-year-old native of Verdun, Que., who has extensive coaching experience. “We’re going to work as a team and try to build something that will make the players proud and be successful.”
Bonner is hoping that Ferguson and Smith will “embrace” Charron’s hiring.
“You . . . be a sponge. It’ll be great for their careers,” Bonner said. “They’re going to get used a lot. He’s going to lean on them a lot.”
Meanwhile, two more players checked out yesterday, following goaltender Justin Leclerc, 20, who was released Sunday.
Defenceman Giffen Nyren, 20, and left-winger Brett Lyon, 18, left for the Calgary Hitmen and Vancouver Giants, respectively. Nyren, who had 14 points and 38 penalty minutes in 25 games, was dealt for a conditional sixth-round selection in the 2010 bantam draft. Lyon, with four points and 63 penalty minutes in 23 games, was swapped for defenceman Ryan Funk, 20, who should be on the ice with his new team today.
Funk, from Morden, Man., has played 242 games with the Saskatoon Blades and Vancouver. This season, in 27 games, the 6-foot-0, 188-pounder has five points and 49 penalty minutes.
Funk was a fourth-round pick by Saskatoon in the 2004 bantam draft. He played 72 games with the Blades last season, totalling 21 points and 127 penalty minutes. He also finished at plus-34.
As well, goaltender Kurtis Mucha, 20, who was acquired Sunday from the Portland Winterhawks, was making his way up the I-5 and over the Coquihalla on Monday. He, too, should practise with the Blazers today.
When Funk and Mucha arrive, they will find a head coach who has a reputation throughout hockey as a teacher and who says he will begin his work here by concentrating on goals-against and penalty killing. The Blazers have surrendered a WHL-high 122 goals; their penalty killing ranks 19th in the 22-team league.
“I had the opportunity to watch a couple of games on the Internet,” Charron said. “You can’t be too judgmental because you’re watching on a small screen. But I was able to see a couple of things . . . and the statistics don’t lie, whether it’s the goals-against or the penalty killing. I felt I could help the team in those specific areas, especially the goals-against.”
The players also will find a head coach who is every inch a professional.
“The first thing I really noticed was his professionalism . . . his preparation for the interview,” said Bonner who, along with majority owner Tom Gaglardi, met Charron last week in Calgary. “He knew our team. He had watched our team. He knew some of the personnel.”
Charron also got rave reviews from the likes of former Blazers coaches Tom Renney and Ken Hitchcock, and from Boston Bruins head coach Claude Julien who, as head coach of the Montreal Canadiens, had Charron on his staff.
“Those people talked highly of Guy,” Bonner said. “All have said he’s a good person . . . but they also said they’re not trying to sell him to us because he’s a good guy. They think he can help our program.”
Mark Recchi, one of the Blazers’ five owners, plays for the Bruins and spoke at length with Julien about Charron.
“I had some good people speak on my behalf,” Charron said. “I had a few people say nice things about me.”
The foundation for Charron’s coaching philosophy comes from the time he spent working under Dave King with the Canadian national team, including at the 1988 Olympic Winter Games in Calgary, and the Calgary Flames (1993-95).
“My stint with Dave King was very informative for me with the Olympic team and with the Calgary Flames,” Charron said. “I consider him one of the strongest teachers in our business.”
King, considered one of Canada’s all-time great coaches, now is an assistant coach with the Phoenix Coyotes.
Charron last coached two seasons ago, his third as an assistant with the Florida Panthers. A coaching change there brought in Peter DeBoer and Charron left rather than accept a move into player development.
“I decided I needed to reassess what I wanted to do,” Charron said of an NHL franchise that has struggled on the ice and with ownership concerns, “and the organization wasn’t as inviting as it might have been.”
He and his wife, Michele, who is a Regina native, moved to Calgary, where they originally met and where Charron’s two children from his first marriage live. The Charrons plan on retiring in western Canada.
JUST NOTES: Charron is the Blazers’ fifth head coach since this ownership group completed the purchase of the franchise on Oct. 25, 2007. . . . Bonner said he hadn’t yet heard of any interest from other teams in Leclerc, who was placed on waivers Monday morning. If Leclerc isn’t claimed by Wednesday morning he will become a free agent, meaning he could sign in any league. . . . Blazers RW Tyler Shattock, the team captain, will play for Team WHL against a touring Russian side on Thursday in Kelowna. . . . The Prince George Cougars have acquired F Spencer Asuchak, who turned 18 on Sunday, from the Tri-City Americans for a 13th-round 2010 bantam draft pick. The 6-foot-4, 210-pound Asuchak, who is from Kamloops, has four points in 12 games this season. He is expected to practise with the Cougars today and play Friday against the visiting Vancouver Giants.

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
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