The Erie Otters' season is over. Head coach Stan Butler's work is just beginning
It's no secret that hockey is a way of life in Canada.
Stan Butler will attest to that.
Butler, 67, was hired as the 10th coach of the Erie Otters in January. The East York, Ontario, native took over for B.J. Adams, who was fired Jan. 9 after the franchise's fourth straight loss during a stretch where the they won twice in 16 games.
Taking over: Erie Otters hire longtime OHL coach Stan Butler to lead team
Butler, once he received immigration approval, took charge of Erie's bench in early February. It marked his return to Ontario Hockey League coaching for the first time since December 2019, when he was reassigned as a special adviser for the North Bay Battalion.
Butler was coach and general manager of that franchise for a league-record 22 straight seasons. The Battalion, formerly located in Brampton, competed in the league's Robertson Cup championship series in 2009 and 2014.
Butler's 742 victories and 1,610 games as a coach, split between the Oshawa Generals and North Bay, each rank in in the OHL's all-time top five.
Hockey, though, isn't the only sport Butler has experienced. The University of Toronto graduate, who also earned a master's degree in education from Brock University, was a teacher with the Scarborough (Ontario) Board of Education for 14 years.
“My last job with the school board, I was a physical education consultant,” Butler said. “What that meant was I basically ran all of the sports programs for what, at that time, was the fourth-biggest school board in the country. When I did that, I did a lot of in-services and teaching teachers.
“When you got to teach teachers, it made you an even better teacher. Now, you're teaching the people who teach kids.”
It was that background which drew the attention of Oshawa's front office in the summer of 1994. Despite Butler's minuscule experience coaching hockey, they still called to see if he'd be interested in becoming the true general of the Generals.
Butler's original answer was no. However, when they insisted they still wanted to formally speak, he started to change his mind.
“I had a good job and I was very happy doing what I was doing,” Butler said. “But the one thing about me is I'm not afraid of challenges. That's one thing which excited me about coming (to Erie). I wasn't concerned about the hard work, but I thought it would be a challenge.”
Butler spoke with the Erie Times-News late in the Otters' 21-40-2-5 season. Erie hasn't qualified for the OHL playoffs since it won the Robertson Cup in 2017.
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Question: Won-loss record aside, what are your thoughts on the franchise's status since you were hired?
Answer: Obviously, there's a process here that we need to do. Any time that you come into a team (midway) through the season, there's a lot of catch-up. What I tried to do was instill some stuff into the guys that, going forward, will make us a better team and a more competitive team in the years to come.
How long have you known Dave Brown, the Otters' general manager?
At least 25 years. We've never worked together but have competed against each other. There's always been that professional level of respect between the two of us.
When the Otters fired B.J. Adams, which of you spoke first about taking over as the team's next coach?
Dave reached out to me. Once (the Otters) made the coaching change, they reached out to me just to see if I had some interest. I explained to them that I was still under contract (with North Bay) and they had to seek permission to speak with me. Which they did. After that, we had some dialogue.
I'd known Dave a long time, and I was very impressed with (Erie owner) Jim Waters. The people of Erie are really lucky to have an owner like him.
We came to an agreement, but the immigration (process) still took a week. When I got approval, on my birthday (Feb. 2), the next day I got in my car and drove through a snowstorm to get here.
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Was there a desire to return as a hockey coach, OHL or otherwise, over your three-plus years' hiatus?
I really didn't have an opinion on that one way or the other. I knew I was going to get back into hockey but, quite frankly, seeing that I was still getting paid (by North Bay), it wasn't an urgent thing. At my age, I could have retired. I wasn't looking so much at coaching. I was looking at some other options that were presented to me.
Dave and Jim talked to me, and they gave me an overview of what was going on (with the Otters). Dave was a guy I'd always like to have worked with so when the opportunity arose to work with him, plus the comfort level with Jim, I decided to say, 'Hey, age is only what's on your birth certificate.'
Anyone who knows me knows that I probably don't look my age, and I don't feel my age.
What do you remember as the players' initial reaction to your presence?
The kids were good. Like any change, everyone has a different way of doing things. I went over with them the way I'd like to do things and we moved forward from there.
What was your first experience coaching hockey?
I fell into coaching by accident. It wasn't something that I planned (as a career). Originally, I was a physical education teacher in Scarborough, a suburb of Toronto. I coached everything. Basketball. Volleyball. Everything you could think.
When I started coaching hockey, I was just giving back to an association that I was involved with as a kid. Then my teams kept winning and eventually, when I was 38, I made the change to (coaching in the OHL) and teaching hockey full time.
How was your learning curve at that point?
From a coaching perspective, I'd won a lot of championships in a lot of sports. Some people that I taught with would probably tell you they didn't know I was a hockey coach.
Scarborough is a very multicultural city, so I coached a lot of diversified sports. What I mean by that is I didn't just coach hockey.
I think the best way to describe it is I was a coach first and became a hockey coach later.
How did coaching other sports translate into coaching hockey?
I had a lot of success coaching basketball. If you take the goalie out of the game, there's a lot of similarities between basketball and hockey.
There's five players (per team) in basketball and five (skaters) in hockey, so a lot of their concepts for me were quite interchangeable. I think by having that (background) aspect was helpful. As a kid, I also played a lot of lacrosse and lacrosse is also very similar to hockey.
So I think what I tried to do when I started (coaching) was to take the concepts from those two sports and, I guess you could say, supplement my resume when it came to coaching hockey.
What's the most notable change in the sport since you started coaching in the OHL in the mid-1990s?
The game has evolved to be more skilled with less physicality. With technology and video, we're also coaching more and more in a dark room.
Have you had to adjust your coaching style over that same span?
Kids today are more visual learners than auditory learners. That's one (change) you had to do. You have to show them instead of telling them.
The other thing is, it's not so much the message but the delivery of the message. It's how you deliver it to them.
What are some of the pluses and minuses you've noticed in the players during your abbreviated tenure with Erie?
My focus since I got here, quite frankly, was to get to know the kids and focus on the five-on-five play.
There is a group of young talent here that I think we can grow. There is a better team here going down the road, but we've got to cut our goals-against in order to be successful. We also need to be a better team on special teams, which is something we'll strive for going forward.
Were you personally familiar with any of the Otters before your arrival?
No, but that was probably good for them. There was no preconceived (notion) about any of us.
How much longer do you see yourself coaching, be it with the Otters or elsewhere?
I gave my word to (the Otters) that as long as my health is good, it would be for two years after this (past) season. I want to see this thing through.
Contact Mike Copper at mcopper@timesnews.com. Follow him on Twitter @ETNcopper.
This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Erie Otters coach Stan Butler sees growth potential after 2 months
