GMH "Jack Adams" Award

I tallied up the few nominations we got in the GMH 09-10 Awards thread, and these are the four leading vote getters (we had a two-way tie between Tippett and Gordon).

Cory Clouston (OTT)
Joe Sacco (COL)
Dave Tippett (PHX)
Scott Gordon (NYI)

You may vote for one of these four.

THat 11 game run he took the Sens on was stunning. Really demonstrates the effect he has on the team. He took a team that honestly was not supposed to be anywhere near where they stand currently, and made the difference.

How can I go against our coach? No way, Clouston all the way.

I love what Tippett has done though, wow - and all the others actually.

I voted Clouston as well - biased? Perhaps, but again the 11-game winning streak, the way he has taken control of this team, and being bale to fight back and win, whatever he is doing is working. And this is a team that was projected to miss the playoffs, and is leading the division.

Tippet easily.

Clouston. The Sens weren't expected to do anything this season, and I don't like it when a first year coach gets the award. Who knows, the Coyotes may only be doing so well becasue they hated Gretzky's coaching. With Clouston, he has been around for about a year and a bit, so you can really see that it's HIS system and his coaching that really makes an impact on the team.

Clouston for me. I've been "nominating" him for a while, before it even became popular. Basically, I just could not figure out what the hell the Sens were doing winning. This was before the winning streak; this is when they were missing their entire top line, significant time missed by their alleged best D-man (Kuba), Neil, A-Train, their #1 goalie; a defensive corps starring a career AHLer and a 19-year-old undersized rookie.

Tippet, meh, he's got a team built over many years of sucking badly. There are a lot of high draft picks on that team and, frankly, are they really doing that great or are they finally achieving expectations?

Maybe Bias but Clouston.

Maybe Tippet.

Clouston for me but I'm surprised there's not even one vote for Sacco. Is it because they slid out of first in their division?

Cap'n Clutch wrote:Clouston for me but I'm surprised there's not even one vote for Sacco. Is it because they slid out of first in their division?

Anderson's been very good for them, plus the division isn't exactly strong. You've got the Wings plagued by injuries, the Flames on auto-destruct, and the Oilers, of course.

Clouston has had to deal with inconsistent goaltending, rookies/AHLers on D and significant injuries.

Plus this forum is a tad biased.

It's now a tad less biased. There's one vote for Sacco now.

I voted for Sacco. What he's done in Colorado is nothing short of a miracle. Almost every single analyst predicted they'd be coming in last in the league.

PKC wrote:I voted for Sacco. What he's done in Colorado is nothing short of a miracle. Almost every single analyst predicted they'd be coming in last in the league.

Duchene, O'Reilly and Anderson have a lot to do with that, but yes, they've been almost a miracle out there. To be where they are right now...amazing.

EDIT: Tippett in Phoenix though....wow, who would have thought they'd be anywhere other than the basement in the West? What a rag tag bunch of cast offs that are ripping it up. So neat to see.

What Clouston's done is close to being as remarkable though. He took a team that bombed last year back to believing in themselves. He brought back a system to Ottawa, one that is even more up tempo than Murray's while being surprisingly defensively sound - and he's gotten the most out of every single player under his command. Astounding. That's why he got my vote (and I'm biased )

PKC wrote:I voted for Sacco. What he's done in Colorado is nothing short of a miracle. Almost every single analyst predicted they'd be coming in last in the league.

It was close for me. It was between Sacco and Clouston. Ottawa was supposed to be in 11th which isn't much better than bottom of the league and Ottawa is in 3rd vs. Colorado currently in 6th? Ottawa has a realistic shot at 3rd or even 2nd in the Conference compared to Colorado who, based on the last few weeks of play won't finish much higher than they are now.

I voted for Sacco because he didn't have the same kind of talent on his roster that we did on ours. While many analysts chose us to finish out of the playoffs, fans of the team knew we'd at least be a playoff team. Clouston gets a nomination because he took us from a fringe playoff team to a division-leading team.

Sacco on the other hand arguably didn't have any of the kind of talent found on our roster (Alfredsson, Kovalev, Spezza, Fisher, Michalek, etc.) so he was relying on a fresh-faced rookie, a career backup goaltender, and a rag-tag crew of forwards and defensemen to spark his gameplans. And he's executed them nearly to perfection.

Again, his team was hand-picked to be last in the NHL this year, and he's taken them to close to a division lead in what was considered one of the toughest divisions in the league this year.