|
Thursday, January 8, 2009
|
|
|
|
Temp:
|
-14°C
|
|
Feels like:
|
-19°C
|
|
Humidity:
|
82%
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Cougars coach takes a hit for the team |
|
|
|
Written by Citizen staff
|
|
Monday, 01 December 2008 |
Don’t blame Drew Schoneck.
As expected, the Prince George Cougars’ embattled head coach took the fall Monday for the team’s seven-week skid down the Western Hockey League standings.
A season that began with such unexpected promise -- six wins in their first seven games -- gave way to the cold bite of reality. It quickly became apparent that the team’s quick start was due more to a weak schedule -- three wins against Chilliwack, two against Seattle -- than any wishful fantasies that this club would be a contender this year.
Schoneck’s firing is no different than the previous ones -- Mike Vandekamp, Lane Lambert and Ed Dempsey -- all prompted by poor results.
The common thread among all four coaches is general manager Dallas Thompson, the person responsible for delivering the players for the coach to mould into a successful team. That’s how it’s supposed to work.
By firing the coach, the Cougars hierarchy has assumed that its players or the person who assembled them aren’t the problem.
Once again, it’s the coach’s fault.
In most team sports organizations that have struggled as long as this one, the microscope would have been on the general manager long ago. But as anyone who follows the Cougars knows, Thompson is the son-in-law of owner Rick Brodsky.
So how does an owner fire his son-in-law?
Brodsky, in an interview a couple years ago with Citizen sports editor Jim Swanson, said he was confident he wouldn’t have to fire Thompson; that Thompson would know when it’s time to go.
It’s a situation any other GM can only dream about. Does he have full immunity, a job for life?
Had the Cougars been winning all these years, no one would bat an eye at the owner-GM relationship.
But they haven’t, and sooner or later the general manager has to be held responsible. Firing another coach in mid-season -- when it’s most difficult to find a qualified replacement -- isn’t the answer. It certainly hasn’t worked so far.
Besides, Thompson hired Schoneck -- and Vanderkamp and Lambert -- as the tonic to past failures.
After the two home-ice blowouts on the weekend to Regina and Saskatoon, it’s no surprise a change is being made and everyone knew it would be Schoneck who pays the price.
The coach always does in Cougarville. And nothing else changes, either.
 |
|
Last Updated ( Tuesday, 02 December 2008 )
|
|
|
Who's Online
We have 260 guests and 11 members online
|
|
|
|
Subscribe to this comment's feed
It goes way beyond not finding a qualified replacement. What quality person in their right mind would come here under these working conditions of a revolving door of Coaches, and bad team management?
My Christmas Wish.... Brodsky gets sick and tired of this business and sells the team to Dan Hamhuis.