Mike Babcock ready to disprove critics... again
By: James Scarfone
Posted: 10/15/03
On his way to a pre-season game against the Florida Panthers, trying to conquer the series of parking lots that is the Los Angeles freeway system, Mike Babcock goes through the paces on his cell phone. Though he's already accustomed to the media scrums he's encountered during training camp, the Saskatchewan native handles the ride and the mid-afternoon call from his alma mater's newspaper like he would sudden death overtime in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup final: Cool, calm, and collected.
This represents just the beginning of the description of Babcock's exterior. On the inside, though, he emanates an aura of confidence, compassion, and a staunch love for his hockey club.
Babcock enters his second season as the head coach of the National Hockey League's Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, a team that made headlines during last year's unexpected playoff run. The Ducks made mincemeat of most of their opponents, sweeping the defending champion Detroit Red Wings, and then cruising past Dallas and Minnesota before bowing out to New Jersey in the Stanley Cup final. According to the McGill graduate, however, the chain of events was no surprise to him and his players.
"We thought we had a legitimate shot," he said, all the while wondering why I asked him a question that would be better suited for an Arizona Cardinals team going to the Super Bowl.
"It would've been a shock [to win]," he conceded, "but as we got better every game, we started to believe. In the end, it was all about good chemistry."
Babcock's simple philosophy on the ice is achingly similar to his demeanour away from the rink. The prairie boy turned suave Californian may cruise up and down the BMW-crowded freeways of Southern California with his clean-cut hairstyle and fine suits these days, but he will always remember where he came from.
Babcock recalls that he and a bunch of hockey majors were engrossed with their Animal House-like existence in their rue Durocher apartment during the mid-1980s. To that end, he got tickets for his old college buddies, including long-time friend Earl Zukerman, McGill's sports information officer, to attend Game 2 of the Cup final in New Jersey this past spring.
"That's what university is all about, you make good friends and they're your friends for life. These guys are smart guys and they are all a success, even more so than me," Babcock said, alluding to the fact that his friends are more accomplished than he is as a hockey coach. "Earl does a great job of keeping everyone in touch when he sends us [McGill] stats by e-mail to give us an update."
"These guys did things first class for students; they were a close-knit bunch who helped turn around our hockey program," Zukerman added.
As the 40-year-old names off every one of his roommates from years past and their forays into business and economics, riding on the success of their MBAs, the man they call "Babs" can't see himself as coming out on the top of his class.
How many CEOs get to meet Sergei Federov and get Giggy with it, though?
Like many people, Babcock misses his university-playing days. He pines for the toga parties in the apartment and all the aspects of college life.
But he doesn't miss skating in the big leagues. Aware of the fact that McGill is not a haven for NHL prospects, he prepared himself for, well, anything but playing hockey.
"I had no idea," Babcock recalled. "McGill wasn't the place for hockey experience, it was for life experience. The skills you develop there and learning from the people around you, it prepared me for life. I was proud to have gone there."
After attending grad school at McGill studying sports psychology, he seized the opportunity to coach a team across the pond in England. The job put him on track for the dream coaching job, at the Pond in Anaheim.
"I enjoyed my teaching experience [in England]," Babcock remarked. "After that, I got a job offer at Red Deer [Alberta] College. My McGill background gave me that opportunity."
It would only be a little more than a decade later that the Ducks coach would again credit his Redmen history in getting him the job in Anaheim.
General Manager Bryan Murray is a former McGill student as well, and was ecstatic that Babcock could coach Disney's team, as evidenced by Babcock's hiring occurring only 20 days after Murray took the GM position.
"I felt he was the only guy [for the job]," Murray told the New York Post. "We don't give enough credit to the guys that have coached below, but lots of guys [who] have coached world tournaments, junior hockey and American League hockey are pretty mature when they get here."
Murray referred to Babcock's stints as head coach with the University of Lethbridge, winning a national championship in 1994 and coach of the year honours there, and in the Western Hockey League with Moose Jaw and Spokane, earning two more best coach awards. Babcock then took the Ducks' AHL affiliate in Cincinnati to a franchise-record 41 wins in 2000-01, which is where his current boss spotted his impressive hockey mind.
Although he was in a rush to get to the game and had already pulled up to his priority parking space, Babcock took the time to praise his boss, articulating each word so that every positive thing he said would be captured.
"Bryan is the most high quality man I've ever worked with," the sophomore coach said. "He's a people-first kind of guy. He's not worried about reporters, only his players. He just makes people feel good."
While an all-star defenceman with the Redmen, scoring 22 goals and 85 assists for 107 points in 146 career games, Babcock also received 301 penalty minutes, a good indicator of his intense nature.
When asked if he would continue using the trap, a strategy that took the Ducks to the Stanley Cup, he quickly responded by blaming the media for portraying negatively the 90s phenomenon, defending the trap like it was his own player being criticized.
Babcock has been in the game long enough to dismiss questions he deems imprudent. He has even gone so far as to criticize Minnesota Wild coach Jacques Lemaire during a playoff game for overly physical play. He doesn't lay off the officials either, getting as vocal as many seasoned coaches do.
For now, though, Babcock is interested in getting through to his players by being upfront with all of them, and letting them know how to improve their game. He hopes that will result in the fulfillment of his goal this season, which is, of course, to seize the holy grail of hockey. Despite losing veterans Paul Kariya, Steve Thomas and Adam Oates, he will believe that's a possibility until somebody beats his Ducks.
"I think we have an improved hockey club," Babcock said. "Adding Federov and Vinny Prospal, plus having the two best centres in the game, can only help us more."
Though he won't take anything less than being number 1, Babcock will take it one game at a time and focus only on what is important at that point in time.
"We just have to play as hard as we can and re-establish our identity."
But he will always identify himself as a member of the McGill Redmen when looking back on his road to the big time.
-with files from the Montreal Gazette © Copyright 2009 The McGill Tribune
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Look at the comedy with that old picture. Great stuff. Second, "re-establish our identity" sounds awfully familiar.
