Berube will quickly command the respect factor needed to lift Leafs - Sport News

Berube will quickly command the respect factor needed to lift Leafs

Blues-Berube-Fired-Hockey
Paul Dennis already sees a lot of Pat Quinn in Craig Berube, before the latter even holds his first team meeting as new headmaster of the Maple Leafs.

Dennis, the former Toronto assistant coach and team psychologist in the early 2000s, was present when Quinn’s first strode into the dressing room at training camp, like Berube, a feared NHLer who’d carried that kind of aggressive aura behind the bench. In Berube’s case, that’s 3,000-plus penalty minutes as player, a Stanley Cup with the St. Louis Blues as coach and the reputation of getting the most from some previous one-way performers. 

Dennis, a retired professor of Sports Psychology at the University of Toronto and before that at York, does not pretend to know Berube personally. But in his long career studying motivational behaviour he can spot the same intagibles Quinn brought to a Leaf team seeking direction back in 1998. They went from two years out of the playoffs right to the conference championship and won seven rounds under Quinn in the next five seasons. 

“Men like that, they just have the presence,” Dennis said. “They walk into the room, don’t say a word, but make eye contact with the players and vice-versa. When Pat began to talk, he commanded complete attention. To see that happen is a special moment.”

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