Sharks, Oilers game reunites Todd McLellan with former team
After a raucous home-opening victory over the Anaheim Ducks, the San Jose Sharks’ new head coach, Peter DeBoer, commented that “last year is in the rear view mirror.”
That image in the mirror comes back into plain view Wednesday night with the Sharks on the road in Edmonton to face the Oilers — and former coach Todd McLellan.
This is the first time that McLellan, who spent seven seasons behind Team Teal’s bench, will face his former team since parting ways with San Jose back in April. To say that it isn’t somewhat of an emotional reunion would be misleading.
According to Kevin Kurz of Comcast SportsNet Bay Area, Sharks forward Logan Couture has kept in touch with his former coach:
“I hope to see (McLellan) in the morning, talk to him a little bit, catch up. I’ve texted back and forth here and there with him. Just to see him will be fun, but we want to beat him.”
McLellan and DeBoer have also kept in touch, Kurz reported, as San Jose's current head coach coached under McLellan at the World Championships in the Czech Republic last May:
Listening to DeBoer speak about McLellan, it’s evident he has tremendous admiration for the Sharks’ all-time wins leader as both a hockey mind and an individual.
“I’ve got a lot of respect and time for Todd. He’s a good man. He’s a good coach,” DeBoer said.
The emotion also goes both ways. Curtis Pashelka of the San Jose Mercury News reported via Twitter from morning skate:
The relationship between McLellan and the Sharks' players was at the forefront of rumors of dressing room dysfunction over the last couple of seasons. Despite being the winningest coach in franchise history, the end of McLellan's tenure in San Jose was marred with speculation that the team's inability to win pivotal games was the result of a bad locker-room culture that he couldn't fix.
All that being said, ending the relationship on a sour note doesn't appear to make the reunion any more bittersweet. It's already a game both teams would love to win — San Jose has lost five of its last six, while Edmonton has won its last three but is still occupy the bottom of the Pacific Division standings.
Clump all of that together, and it should make for one heck of a divisional battle on Wednesday night.
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