Buffalo, NY (WGR 550) – Tuesday was the day that Lindy Ruff was reintroduced as the head coach of the Buffalo Sabres.
Terry Pegula spoke, but didn’t take questions. What he did say was Ruff knows how to win and he knows how to get a team to the next level.
Kevyn Adams said he spoke with many different candidates in the six days leading up to Ruff’s hiring. He said he spoke to ten or more men to be the coach of the team.
Ruff talked a lot about getting the team to the next level and he also said the team is about "now",
“It’ll be my opportunity to put these guys in the right position using their strengths to get them to that next level.”
Ruff declared that they’re going to be committed from Day 1,
"They’re going to be connected and there’s going to be an understanding of how they need to play.”
Ruff said he is going to be clear to the team when they’re together,
“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 Sabre for Sabre fans that I think are some of the greatest in the league, but we’re going to have to earn it.”
Ruff didn’t jump at the job when he was contacted. He said,
“When Kevyn contacted me I didn’t say yes right away, we had a lot of discussions. Just coming off being let go by Jersey and seeing a coach get let go here, I was questioning myself, why would I do this? And 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.”
Ruff said after it was announced that he was coming back he heard from Ryan Miller, Jason Pominville and Thomas Vanek. Ruff said,
“They all said ‘You’re the guy that can get them there.’ And I think if you remember I was pretty hard on Thomas Vanek and we’ve had lots of great conversations, so this team is so similar to where we were at back then, deep with talent, but we needed to play the game the right way.
“We were deep, like three lines deep and then I had useful tools you could lean on people with from Rob Ray, Andrew Peters and Adam Mair.”
Even Matt Barnaby commented,
The last part is what Ruff doesn’t have at all and Adams needs to get in the off season.
Ruff played here and coached here, so he knows what it’s like to be in front of these fans. He wants the current group to experience that,
“I’ve lived in this city since 1979, so I think I understand how great this city is when you have a successful hockey club and it would mean a lot to have this group of players experience what I was able to experience, I mean this building shook im some of the playoff series I was involved with.”
Ruff said he is a much better coach now than when he was before.
“I actually laugh at some of my coaching style when I left here because a lot of things have changed, but I’m a lot better coach now than I was when I left.”
We heard accountability a lot last week from Adams and the players. Ruff has a clear idea of what that means,
“The first thing a person does is hold himself accountable. Did I do enough to get this team to where it needed to go? The next level of accountability when you become a good team is the players themselves will hold each other accountable and the last part of it is the coach who can’t just yell and scream at players anymore, because the way we grow is believing in the way we play and if we don’t, my biggest tool is to take ice time away. My greatest tool is you’re playing well so you get more ice time and you’re going to be that guy I’m going to count on.”
Ruff said he will add to the coaching staff.
Adams spent four years on Lindy Ruff’s staff in player development and coaching. He said it played a role in his hiring,
“I spent four years as part of Lindy’s staff, so that’s four years of learning of seeing Lindy day in and day out the way that he leads and challenges to be the best version of yourself, but also he cares about them and another thing I learned is he was very good with non-negotiables because we’re going to talk about it, but when we agree, then we’re doing that and we’ll hold you to it, so I had that trust and that relationship, so it matters, but that isn’t the reason. It ultimately just came back to me that this is the right coach for this team to win now.”
So what is the plan? What is Ruff’s plan to get to the next level? He said,
“It’s they understand that if we get a little bit better in this area, like our faceoff percentage gets a little bit better, and we have the puck a little bit more, we’re a little bit more willing to get inside on shot lanes and a few more pucks don’t get to the net, all those little one or two percenters make a huge difference because the simplest stuff keeps adding up, sticks on pucks, don’t let him make that play, turn your feet sideways, these are just a lot of one percenters that keep adding up and leads to better.”
Alex Tuch, Connor Clifton, Jacob Bryson and Peyton Krebs were all there on Tuesday in support of Ruff and he spoke with those players for a long time after the press conference.
Photo credit Losi & Gangi 
Local News
