To speak with Hitchcock is to hear a wonderful stream of consciousness, a flow of ideas and concepts and principles that have guided him since his days behind the bench of the Sherwood Park Midget AAA juggernaut from the 1970s into the early 1980s, in the outskirts of his Edmonton hometown.
He has produced champions at every level -- Junior B, Midget AAA in Edmonton, Kamloops in the major-junior Western League, and in the NHL with the Dallas Stars, who he guided to the 1999 Stanley Cup.
The 71-year-old won 849 games, ranked fourth all-time in the NHL, winning the 2011-12 Jack Adams Award with the St. Louis Blues as the best coach in the League.
In 14 of his 22 seasons, he took his teams to the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Hitchcock has also been either head or associate coach internationally for Canada at the IIHF World Championship, World Juniors, World Cup of Hockey and four Olympic Games, winning three gold medals (2002, 2010, 2014).
I do think he had a big impact on our franchise, and really helped develop some of guys that went on to lead us to the cup. His name isn't on it, but he really did contribute to it.
