Tom Rowe still learning, evolving with Panthers

When Tom Rowe coached San Antonio of the American Hockey League in 2014-15, his players gave him a nickname: T-Rex.
"When I would get very mad during practice or after a game, I maybe looked like a T-Rex," Rowe said, laughing. "I never asked too much what it meant, and I really didn't care. I knew the players had a good time calling me that."

He is no dinosaur, though.
Rowe, 60, has spent his career evolving as a player, broadcaster, scout, coach and executive. He was into analytics before they went mainstream in the NHL, going to school to find a student who could help him break down the game in an innovative way.
Now coach as well as general manager of the Florida Panthers, he will continue to learn and adapt as they try to become a speedy, skilled, Stanley Cup championship team like the Pittsburgh Penguins, whom they play at BB&T Center on Thursday (7:30 p.m. ET; FS-F, ROOT, NHL.TV).
After Rowe replaced Gerard Gallant as coach Nov. 28, he told his staff and players he would be different than he was in the AHL. He said he'd demand certain things and hold the players accountable, but he wouldn't be in their faces as much at this level because they didn't need to be told what to do as often. He'd give them respect and expect it in return.
"They were a little bit nervous they were going to see T-Rex, but he sort of quelled that rumor right away," assistant general manager Eric Joyce said.
Rowe said he approached forward Vincent Trocheck individually because they had butted heads when they were together in San Antonio. It wasn't that they had a bad relationship; Trocheck wanted to make plays, and though Rowe didn't want to take away offense, he wanted those plays made in certain areas of the ice.
"I went up to him and said, 'This isn't San Antonio,' " Rowe said. "'I'm not going to be on your back like I was there. You've taken another step. You know what's expected. Just go play.' And he said, 'Yep. I get it.' "
Does that sound like a fossil to you?
"I know I'm 60, and people are probably looking at, 'Man, oh, man, I can't believe they hired a 60-year-old guy to be their head coach,' " Rowe said. "But I'm a pretty progressive thinker, and I want to hear new ideas. I want to always try new things. If a player comes in with a new way to do things and I think it's a good idea, great, we're going to try it. I'm pretty open-minded guy."
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Rowe never set out to coach. He played seven seasons in the NHL as a forward with the Washington Capitals, Hartford Whalers and Detroit Red Wings, and he was the first U.S.-born player to reach 30 goals in a season when he scored 31 for the Capitals in 1978-79.
After he retired, he worked as a broadcaster, assistant general manager and scout for the Whalers, who became the Carolina Hurricanes in 1997. In 2001, Hurricanes GM Jim Rutherford asked him to be an assistant coach for Lowell of the AHL.
"He said, 'Try it for a year. If you don't like it, you can scout for us,'" Rowe said. "Well, I fell in love with the coaching. It was the next best thing to being a player."

Rowe spent three seasons as an assistant and two as coach in Lowell from 2001-06. Along the way, he read the book "Moneyball" by Michael Lewis, the story of how the Oakland A's used analytics in baseball.
He called the dean of the economics department at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell and asked if he could interview students who could break down statistics for him. He connected with a student named Mike Thibault.
"Have you ever read 'Moneyball'?" Rowe asked.
"No," Thibault said.
Rowe gave him the book.
"Well, go home and read it," Rowe told him. "And then why don't you come back in a couple of weeks and tell me what you think?"
Thibault read the book overnight and returned the next day. Thibault, Rowe and assistant Scott Allen batted around ideas. Thibault would stay up until the wee hours of the morning compiling data manually and have reports ready for the coaches before each game. He would identify things such as which players were caught in the defensive zone the most, which players were turning over the puck the most and which players were getting scored on the most.
"It was very, very basic information, but it was concrete information," Rowe said.
Rowe used it to help him match up against opponents and to design practices for his players. Thibault earned the nickname "Theo," after Theo Epstein, who became the youngest GM in Major League Baseball history when the Boston Red Sox hired him in 2002 at age 28. Epstein won the World Series with the Red Sox in 2004 and '07 and won it with the Chicago Cubs this year. Thibault now works as an assistant equipment manager for the New Jersey Devils. Allen is an assistant with the Panthers.
"I kind of laughed when everybody was jumping on the analytics bandwagon, because Scott Allen and I were using it 13, 14 years ago," Rowe said.
Rowe spent two seasons as coach of Albany of the AHL from 2006-08 and three as an assistant with the Hurricanes from 2008-11. Carolina used a company called Coleman Analytics, a joint venture of Richard Coleman, a San Francisco-based statistician, and Mike Smith, the former GM of the Chicago Blackhawks. Rowe said it helped him catch things the naked eye might miss, especially when it came to opposing depth players.

"What the analytics told you was, say, a third-line guy … may have been on a real hot streak for seven or eight games," Rowe said. "Those reports would sniff that out and give you something to talk about in your pregame meeting. 'Guys, so-and-so attacks the ice in this particular area. This is where he's shooting the puck from. Just be aware of it.' "
Rowe spent two seasons as coach of Yaroslavl of the Kontinental Hockey League from 2012-14, before coming back to coach San Antonio for the Panthers' organization. He began last season as coach of Portland of the AHL to start last season after the Panthers moved their affiliation, then became associate GM of the Panthers on Jan. 1 and GM on May 16.
"He's seen the game from a lot of perspectives, and he understands that objective data can help out," Joyce said. "It's not the be all, end all, but it does help in our decision-making process, and he's open to get help from wherever he can find it. For a 60-year-old guy to kind of admit that is refreshing. … If you're not learning, you're dying. He's embraced that."
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Analytics aren't novel anymore.
"Hey, everybody's using it now," Rowe said. "Everybody's using it to a certain degree. It just depends on what level you're using it."
The Panthers have a director of hockey analytics, Brian MacDonald, and an assistant GM more focused on numbers, Steve Werier. Rowe called Joyce a hybrid, saying, "He's got an appreciation for the numbers, but he also has an appreciation for the eye -- good, ol' hockey and character." Rowe and Joyce emphasized their process is collaborative.
When it comes to personnel, the Panthers weigh the numbers heavily. Prime examples: the additions of defenseman Mark Pysyk and forwards Jonathan Marchessault and Colton Sceviour. They would like to build their team like the Penguins, Chicago Blackhawks or Tampa Bay Lightning, because they believe speed and skill can lead to sustained success.
When it comes to coaching, they analyze trends when preparing for games, starting with five- and 10-game sample sizes, looking for areas to exploit, but allow for feel behind the bench. As Joyce said, "We understand every game is a random sample."
"When I'm putting players on the ice and trying to get a certain line out there, then I've kind of got that on my card and I'm looking to take advantage of it," Rowe said. "It's probably what [Toronto Maple Leafs coach] Mike Babcock's doing. It's probably what [Chicago coach] Joel Quenneville's doing. That's what other coaches are doing around the League. So I don't know if I'm really giving you any secrets. Now, are we doing it every single game? No."
Rowe said the next step is finding better ways to use analytics in coaching.
"We haven't been able to come up with a good formula yet," he said. "We do want to use it more on the coaching side to help us shape our game plan every night, and we're not there yet. We've got some information that makes sense, but I'm not even 100 percent sure it's all perfect. So that is something we're going to continue to work on to try to get better."
The evolution continues.
"I know I get tagged as an old dinosaur," Rowe said, "but I'm far from that."