Q&A: Bruce Cassidy with Gary Lawless | Part 3
VGK Head Coach on life as an NHL bench boss
GL: What's your perfect off-day?
BC: Oh, it's golf for sure. We have a (summer) place right on the water with 36 holes of golf right there. My kids are happy, they have stuff to do. My wife loves walking the beach. I play with a group of guys that tee off between 7 and 8 a.m. The group is called the Ospreys. I'm in that group, we get a tee-time the day before, mix the players up. When I play I'm done by lunch. In the summer, if I have nothing else going on, I'll play four or five days a week.
GL: How good are you?
BC: I'm a three handicap. I love golf; it's you against the course. I'm in a team sport and I love that, but golf is a different animal. It's just you, no one else. If you don't hit a good shot you can't say, "well I had my man" or "I was plus one." It's you against the course, and I like that.
I like to be home for lunch, then it's hang around the beach and listen to some music with the kids. Go for a bike ride - I'm an outdoor bike guy, I can't run with my knees. That's something I've done for years wherever I am, even if we didn't have the beach place. I used to ride my bike every morning outside. I love it. You know, assuming the weather is good. So those are my things: golf, getting out on a bike ride, which I get now at Red Rock, now that we're settled in. I'll be able to enjoy some of the weather benefits of Vegas that people talk about.
GL: Can you cook?
BC: Yeah, I can cook on the grill. What would you like on the grill? You like steak? You like burgers? You know, simple chicken? Seabass, scallops, salmon, I'm a fish guy. Some people live to eat, and some people eat to live. I eat to live, so I'm not fancy - there will be no fancy sauces unless you're bringing them. Cocktail sauce out of the bottle or a little bit of lemon and pepper for me, simple. I make a lot of spaghetti sauces for the kids and lasagna.
GL: When they walk in the door and dad's got the apron on in the kitchen, what's the reaction?
BC: No apron, though I should wear one. I don't have one, but I should. That's how they eat. My wife doesn't like to cook - she's a good cook, and I think she's trying to fool us by saying "I'm not a good cook." She's predominantly a vegetarian, so it's simple salads. My kids are getting older now and hopefully, they try different things. Although I'll say my son is a great eater; loves vegetables, loves tomatoes, loves zucchini. My daughter was when she was a little younger, and now she's leaning more towards chicken and pasta and that's it. You won't see a roast for nine hours on the stove, nothing like that. We're quick, we're efficient with our cooking. It's turn on the grill, put some meat on it or fish, or a quick meal that you can make in half an hour.
GL: Do you like the whole experience? Shopping etc.?
BC: Well, I do the grocery shopping in the family - it's actually how I've connected with people in Boston and Providence for years. You run into a lot of people in the grocery store and most of them are very good. It wasn't like "your power play sucks." It's like, "how are you doing?" "The team looks good." "Is Pastrnak healthy?" or whatever. They wanted to know stuff, but they were nice about it and it's started here in Vegas.
GL: You are first place in the Western Conference. What have you and your staff done well?
BC: I think we ran a good training camp, first of all. I would say we checked a lot of the boxes of what we wanted to accomplish. From building blocks, one on one, two on two, three on three, we went into the whole process. We integrated it while we kept the pace up so we could work on playing fast, and we conditioned, we skated. There were three messages we wanted to get across: we want to play with structure, we want to play with pace, and we want to play well in the third period, so our conditioning needs to be good. I thought we ran a really good training camp to get those messages across, how we want to play. I think that is why we got out of the gate well.
I think the second reason we got out of the gate well - and this had nothing to do with us - is the health of our players and that they wanted to play. You've got an excited and motivated team, you put a good plan in place and off we went. I think we've gotten the guys ready play every night, on their toes in first periods. We've been good for the most part. There's been lows, but in general, pretty good. And I'm a big believer in that, it's easier to play the game downhill, you can use your bench, you're not chasing it, it builds confidence in the group when you're not chasing matchups. If you have a lead you're not worried about the other team scoring the next goal.
I think the team has found ways to win, they've done that well. That's a lot of different reasons, right? I guess as coaches we've avoided those long lulls in games where we take ourselves out of the games. In the Calgary game in the second period, we could not get out of our own way, and that ended up costing us, we took all those penalties. We've done a good job of getting out of those ruts, I think as a team. Vancouver even, it's 2-1 for us and all of a sudden, it's 4-2 for them. Those are things for me as a coach that drive me crazy. You're beating yourself up a little bit when those things happen, yet we got out of it and won the hockey game - we scored, and scored, and scored again. So, our guys have recognized when to get their game back.
We're an uneven team right now, we really are. With our record people can say "yeah we're good," but we're uneven and we have another level to get to. That is the encouraging part as a coach. We're 17-6-1 and we have a whole other level we can get to, and I think we're going to need to quite honestly if we're going to expect to be a Stanley Cup favorite. We get to dig in every day and if the players are going to respond to it, then you've really got something. If they're content with where we are, then we've got problems.
GL: Springsteen, Billy Joel, Bob Seger, Depeche Mode, Garth Brooks?
BC: I think I have three country songs on my playlist, so I'm not a country guy but I like it. Jay Pandolfo, we'd drive sometimes together, and he's a country guy. He'd put in on the radio and I'd like it but I just don't have it. My wife and I don't go to Zac Brown Band when they play Fenway, like everyone else does. So that one's probably a no, yet I'm not against it. Depeche Mode, I'll listen to the Cure on Spotify radio when I'm out in the back, reminds me a bit of my youth. I like that type of music.
From there I like Pearl Jam, that's my go to. Pearl Jam and the Tragically Hip are my two favorites. I would say U2 is in there, I've seen them three or four times. But I'm a Pearl Jam guy. I love Eddie Vedder, love his voice. I like the Boss, I like Billy Joel, I'd love to see Rod Stewart, I know he's in town. I still like radio songs, you know. I'm not a hardcore metal guy, my brother was that guy, still kind of is. I didn't mind it, I was a Kiss fan when I was a kid, but I gravitated away. I love Led Zeppelin, but I wouldn't call them hardcore metal like some people do.
GL: If it was your draft year and you had the skill package you did as a junior, but you were playing in today's game, where would you have been drafted?
BC: I was a late first rounder. Don't forget, there were only 21 teams, and it was a lot harder to play back then. I used to love that line. I was picked 17th or 18th that year as an outlier and that type of player. It's hard to say, I'm sure I'd be in the top 10. I don't know who I'd compare myself to; I had a game like Shea Theodore or Quinn Hughes. I was an offensive guy, but I hated getting scored on. I got judged by points, so I had to produce points, and I knew that. I was smart enough to realize that people would say "oh, good game, you had three assists." But I think I'd played better the other night when I had one assist, but we only gave up one goal. I hated getting scored on and took a lot of pride in that part.
I probably would have been higher, just because of the value of those types of players now. I'd go to Chicago's training camp and every defenseman was 6-3. I was 6-0, 190 pounds and one of the smaller guys. Today, that size is probably more average.
GL: Do you like the way the game has changed?
BC: I do. What I don't like about today's NHL game is when there is a clean hit, and then a guy chases the guy down to fight him. Now, what you're losing in the game is those clean hits because every time someone hits someone, he is expected to have to fight. I don't agree with that. If it's a hit from behind, like the one on Pietrangelo in Montreal, I hate that. It's a dangerous and cheap hit. That is where you can get seriously injured. In a clean hit, usually the worst that happens is you get up and your ego is damaged. You might get winded on those open-ice clean hits. I don't mean the ones coming across the ice, I'm just talking about a good, hard hockey hit. Every time someone gets hit now on both sides everyone jumps up.
That's what bothers me, we're losing some physicality from good, clean, hard hits. Part of what makes hockey great is some level of physicality. High-end skill can still function. No one has to fight any more; in the old days you had to do it and if you didn't you were ostracized. Fighters will always fight if they need to or if there is something spontaneous that happens. The physicality, I hope it does not go out of the game, personally, because I think it makes hockey a different animal.
You can't just have 20 guys flying around, toe-dragging. That, to me, is not going to be the best product either. A 10-8 game might appeal to some. I think forcing guys to get inside by being a good defensive player still matters. I still enjoy watching those types of games where players must work hard to create offense. Because when they do score, I love it. I know it isn't as easy as just skating down the ice and getting a free pass.
GL: If you get your name on the Stanley Cup, what do you want to do next?
BC: I think if you get it once, you're going to want it twice. That would be my guess. I went to the University of Ottawa at 19 when I was playing junior, so I liked school and I was a good student. I was at a crossroads when I started coaching, whether I was going back to school for business and get a law degree. I made the decision to get into coaching without knowing how it would turn out.
For me, it would be wanting to see my kids in college, hopefully playing a sport and going to watch them every day whether it's baseball, hockey, or my daughter loves field hockey. I don't know where it is going to take them, but I'd love to be a parent that just follows them around. That is what I'd like to do as an older parent. You might not get that opportunity with grandkids, so you better enjoy it with your kids. My dad died when I was 21, so I never got to golf with him or be men together. That is what I would do. I'd also want to stay in hockey as a consultant somewhere in any capacity.
