Individual Messaging and Loyalty: a Conversation with Dallas Stars Assistant Coach Steve Spott

The veteran coach has seen a thing or two in his decades as a hockey coach

Steve Spott’s first job in the NHL came a decade ago, as an assistant coach on Randy Carlyle’s 2014-15 Toronto Maple Leafs team. And on Carlyle’s desk, Spott noticed something: the letters N-A-T-K.

“You're going to go into a locker room,” Spott recalls Carlyle telling him, “and you're going to address 22 or 23 guys. Not all 23 are going to get that message. So the importance of individually getting to each player with that message is critical.”

“Never Assume They Know,” Spott explains. “I thought that was one of the best messages I ever got as a young coach.”

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I had a chance to sit down with Steve Spott after the 4 Nations break last week, and during our conversation, one thing kept jumping out, one big advantage Spott has when it comes to delivering messages to a bunch of individuals who also happen to be among the best hockey players in the world: Spott was a teacher back in Scarborough, Ontario, after graduating with his education degree, with long-term designs on being a school principal someday.

So while he did leave teaching in 1997, when his friend Pete DeBoer offered him a chance to join his coaching staff for the Plymouth Whalers of the OHL, I’m not sure you can say that Spott isn’t still teaching. He just happens to be teaching the same 20-some players for most of the year.

So DeBoer brought Spott on board, and the rest is history. Or at least, history in the making.

Spott and DeBoer would join the OHL’s Kitchener Rangers after four years in Plymouth, eventually winning both the OHL’s J. Ross Robertson Cup as well as the prestigious Memorial Cup in 2002-03. After another five years, the duo would win another OHL championship in 2008, after which DeBoer was hired to coach the NHL’s Florida Panthers.

Spott would take over as Kitchener’s head coach (and general manager) until 2013, when he was hired to be the head coach of the Toronto Marlies of the AHL. Spott led the Marlies to a 45-25-6 record and the third round of the playoffs, after which Carlyle brought him aboard in Toronto.

But that would be Carlyle’s last year with the Leafs. Carlyle was fired mid-season, and Brendan Shanahan would clean house entirely in the summer, firing GM Dave Nonis as well as a host of other folks—including the remainder of the coaching staff.

Spott wouldn’t be out of a job long, though. As DeBoer told Hockey Canada upon Spott’s selection to be the head coach for Hockey Canada at World Juniors in 2013, Spott has always been a coach in high demand.

“He had a lot of opportunities to leave and go be a head guy,” DeBoer says. “A lot of people knocked on the door during those 12 years to take him away and rightfully so.”

“I think (there was) loyalty, we worked well together, there was a real comfort level and I’d like to think the two of us pushed each other.”

So when Spott found himself available in 2015 a couple months after DeBoer was hired to coach San Jose, the duo reunited, and they’ve stuck together ever since.

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The more you listen to Steve Spott, the more you realize just how effectively he knows how to get his point across.

For instance, just watch the below video and note how he goes over a large amount of information, curating it to give the players listening just enough to use without overwhelming them or repeating himself:

That ability to determine the critical information to communicate while also communicating it concisely is a big deal in any classroom, let alone a room with NHL players two hours before a televised hockey game. Holding the attention of players in these sorts of meetings over the course of an 82-game season (and more) is a tough thing at the best of times; you can imagine how tough it can be when a team’s struggling.

However, I’d wager that’s where Spott’s teaching experience really shines. He’s not wasting your time or boring you, but he’s also not shouting at everyone each day. He’s steady and consistent, and he knows the details.

As Ryan Murphy said of Spott over a decade ago:

“[Steve Spott’s] not one to come in and pat you on the back in front of everyone. He’ll let you know how you’re playing by the amount of ice you get or the amount of power play you get. You’ll know when he’s displeased, but he’s pretty good. He knows the times to call you out and the times when he should be easy on you.”

Every teacher knows that respect is the fine line between intimidation and permissiveness. You want to be strict and caring in equal measure. It’s tough to do, but when you strike that balance, deep loyalty tends to follow.

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As Stars fans know, the the bonds that link DeBoer and Spott are strong ones indeed, and they’ve been coaching together for a decade now in the NHL—in San Jose, then Vegas, and now Dallas.

“We’ve done pretty much everything from running arenas to coaching teams and managing teams, and it’s been a long journey,” Spott says. “The one thing I think that’s always worked is he’s never made me feel like an assistant coach, and that’s been always been appreciated.”

On other NHL benches, that isn’t necessarily the case. But with DeBoer, whose coaching staff also includes another former NHL head coach in Alain Nasreddine, he sees value in having that experience on his staff—even if the head coach ultimately makes the final decision.

“He makes you feel like you’re a part of the process, part of the decisions,” Spott says. “He makes all the final decisions, but at the same time, as an assistant coach, he makes you feel like you’re a part of that.”

The chemistry among the coaches is one thing, but Spott is uniquely qualified to identify just what has made Pete DeBoer not just someone you want to work with, but also the 17th-winningest head coach in NHL history.

“I think there’s a couple of things,” Spott says of what makes DeBoer so successful. “One, you have to have a tactical knowledge of the game. His is elite. But he’s a lawyer by trade—a lot of people forget that. He has the ability to command a room. He has the ability to command an audience, which in our situation is a hockey team. He’s got a presence.”

“But what fans don’t get to see is what [DeBoer] does behind the curtain,” Spott continues. “His individual meetings with players. And whether it be, ‘We need more,’ or ‘We like what you’re doing, let’s keep it going,’ he has those meetings regularly with our players. So I think the biggest thing for us is, there’s no player that can leave our facility after a game or after practice saying, ‘I don’t know what Pete wants.’ Everybody’s on board, and he’s very clear with what he expects of each individual player.”

With this coaching staff, the responsibilities are clearly defined. Some duties include the “pre-scout” for each game, done by Misha Donskov (who also does much more). Jeff Reese works with the goaltenders, while Nasreddine coaches the penalty kill and defensemen. Spott, of course, heads up the forwards and the power play.

But that doesn’t mean they’re working in isolation. In fact, they’re all in the same office. And they want to hear what each other thinks.

“Ultimately, when we put our [special teams] meetings together, we do it individually,” Spott says. “But there's four of us in the same office: myself, Alain, Jeff Reese, and [Misha Donskov]. It's hugely collaborative. We are spinning our screens non-stop, sharing clips with each other, things we like, things we would show [in a meeting], things we wouldn't show, things that may be redundant. So it's completely collaborative, and then at the end of the day, everything works through Pete.”

“Yes, we have our areas: drills, things that we like to do with our individual power plays, meetings individually, penalty kill individually, with our units. But ultimately, it's very, very collaborative,” Spott emphasizes, “so that when we leave, the message is clear after practice or after a pregame meeting. Everybody's on the same page.

“Ultimately, yes, we're responsible for those areas, but we're also not ignorant enough not to use each other's intelligence when it comes to decisions.”

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After coaches have done the work to determine what needs to be communicated, the next step is the communication itself.

Some of the “what” is basic information like routes, coverage, and plays the opposition like to try. But when it comes to the “how,” numbers are going to come into it at some point. Whether you want to use the term “analytics” or “expected goals” or simply “the numbers,” every coach has to figure out a way to communicate what the objective data are saying while particularizing it to the player(s) and making it digestible.

When it comes to this year’s Stars team, they have quite a few younger players, some of whom have had tough stretches, like Logan Stankoven’s 25-game goal drought. And while DeBoer might be the primary person to communicate a point, assistant coaches are a big part of the emotional balancing act that a coaching staff has to manage, too.

“I think Pete’s attention to detail is unparalleled,” Spott says. “There’s no message to the players or to us as a staff that is not known.”

One such message might be needed when players are getting chances but not scoring. In such a case, how do Spott and DeBoer balance the fact that the data (or “analytics”) might be showing a player is creating chances while the player is feeling frustrated at the lack of points?

“I think one of the biggest jobs we have as assistant coaches is that meeting,” Spott says, “where we will sit with Logan, Mavrik Bourque, Wyatt Johnson, and we will show them video, which will be, ‘these are areas that I think we can get better at.’ ‘These are areas that you're doing a great job,’ or ‘Analytically you’re doing a great job, however, you're not getting enough shots. You're not attacking this area enough based on the numbers. It's that it's that fine balance of using [analytics]. Areas you can get better, and where you can stay patient because you are getting chances.”

Spott goes on to point out that, no matter how compelling your presentation might be, seeing results at some point is still really crucial for scorers, no matter how those results come.

For goal scorers. It's really simple,” Spott says. “Even if they get one off a foot, even if they get one in an empty net. People don't understand that when Jason Robertson scores in an empty net, it's just as important as when he scores five-on-four on a power play. Like, that's important to him. He's a goal-scorer. That's how he's driven, and I think for Logan or [Mavrik], those young players, once they see the analytics, once they see, “Yes, I'm getting chances,” or “I'm not getting to those areas,” then they become positive tools for us to use for them.

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Another element of communication is the generation gap, particularly with some of the younger players on this year’s Stars team. But Spott thinks they have a little bit of an advantage, there, too.

“For Pete and I, we’re lucky…we’ve got sons and teenage daughters,” Spott says, “So when we go home, we’re living with kids that are at that same age level as a Wyatt Johnston or a Logan Stankoven.”

But one thing any parent will tell you is that with each new generation, the role of technology has become more prominent than ever, for good or for ill. And for NHL coaches, it’s no different.

“Never in my life did I think I’d be using an iPad on the bench to have a player look at his shift and see what he did well or an area of improvement,” Spott says. “I think technology and the ability to grasp it and learn it has probably been the biggest change in my time. As parents, we’re dealing with technology, and as coaches, we’re dealing with technology. So I think we’ve been fortunate that we’ve come up with that type of an environment where we’ve had to grow as parents, and we’ve had to grow as coaches.”

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That growth has been apparent, especially this year, when the Stars have faced more adversity than in either of Spott and DeBoer’s first two years in Dallas. Jason Robertson had surgery to remove a cyst over the summer, while Wyatt Johnston and Mavrik Bourque suffered lower-body injuries. Those things all contributed to delaying the best versions of those players until later in the season.

On top of that (or perhaps also because of it), the power play also started out very slowly, which was only highlighted by the Stars’ lack of power play goals in their Western Conference Final loss to Edmonton last spring to the end their season.

Before the Stars realized just how much of an effect the injuries to this year’s personnel would have, things seemed pretty simple, going into this year.

“You know, the ultimate change coming into the season was very simply, Joe Pavelski out, Wyatt Johnson in. That was very simple math. I slept very well this summer,” laughs Spott, before shaking his head. “But all best-laid plans...”

Indeed, Johnston was the ideal replacement for Pavelski’s creativity and scoring. But the 21-year-old former tenant of the Pavelski household missed a good chunk of the preseason with an injury, and Johnston didn’t quite pick up where the former veteran left off.

“Not to make it about Joe Pavelski,” Spott says, (echoing DeBoer multiple times this year so far) “But that's a huge loss for our hockey club. He's a Hall of Famer, maybe one of the best of all time on the power play with tipping pucks. It's hard to replace that. But we are finding ways, and as we talked yesterday, I feel the mental state of the group is real good right now.”¹

Much like a baseball team whose pitchers are struggling, or a football team whose special teams are a mess, fans always want to find someone to blame when the power play or the penalty kill isn’t clicking. And when the power play was struggling early in the season, Spott’s name was a hot topic among fans.

Or at least, the power play was struggling, until Spott and company found a way to reverse some of the troubling trends early in the season. And now, in the 22 games since January 1st, the Stars have had the second-best power play in the NHL.

But that didn’t happen by accident. Even before Miro Heiskanen went out with a knee injury, fans began to notice that players weren’t in their old positions on the top power play unit. And a lot of those shifts coincided with the uptick in power play production.

“Hopefully, it stays,” Spott says of the power play’s recent performance, “But I think having Roope [Hintz] at the net front, and Jason Robertson, we took off a flank, that's a huge adjustment for our power play. [Robertson's] done that for the last two years, and his whole career, really. So getting Matt Duchene on that flank, Jason in the middle, and Roope at the net…those are big changes. Some work, some don't. And right now, we're happy with where the five guys are.”

But it’s one thing to move players around like chess pieces on a piece of paper. To actually sit down with a player like Robertson to tell him about those changes is another matter altogether.

“It’s a fine line,” Spott says. “I like patience, I like giving guys the opportunity to continue because they've done it the last couple of years, but at some point, they're looking for answers. And I think as coaches we have to look through their eyes and think how they are thinking: that we need a change, we need a kick.²

“For Robertson, he wants information,” Spott says. “So it’s a meeting [to say] ‘This is the reason why,’ ‘this is where we think you have the best opportunity to get more pucks and you have the best opportunity to to score.’ So, I think it's just messaging not only to the five guys, but individually to understand that’s part of the reasoning, and get them to buy into that.”

In other words: Never Assume They Know.

Spott has one other advantage when it comes to communicating those answers to the players. Or rather, the entire team has it.

“The nice thing for me is Jamie Benn is one of the greatest captains I've ever worked with,” Spott says. “When you meet with Jamie and say, okay, Jamie, we've got to make a shift, [his response is] ‘Absolutely.’ And he's the first guy then to help with our messaging.”

That messaging isn’t just talk, either. Benn has lived it, first with reduced ice time in recent years as part of the team’s old motto, “A Little Less for a Lot More.”

And he’s embraced that philosophy even more recently, too. Because when Matt Duchene was moved onto the top power play unit, Jamie Benn was the one to move down to the second unit.

It’s no secret how badly everyone on the team wanted to win a Cup for Joe Pavelski last year. And while that didn’t pan out, the team still has a chance to follow Benn’s lead, and to listen to the messages he reinforces from top down. Because when Benn leads, players are more than willing to follow him: whether into battle, or into taking a bit less for the greater good.

In Spott’s first year in Dallas, Jamie Benn’s reckless penalty on Mark Stone was a big part of the narrative around the Stars’ loss. But last season, Benn and the Stars managed to get past Spott’s old team in seven games. In fact, that game is one of Spott’s fondest memories in Dallas so far.

“I think getting through Vegas was a real mental test for our guys: we can do it,” Spott says. “And we’re hoping that layer of bark on our hockey club is going to serve well as we go forward here.”

One thing Spott didn’t say is that Vegas won a Stanley Cup the season after moving on from DeBoer and Spott. And while the two have hoisted a couple of trophies in the OHL together, they have yet to win it all in the NHL.

So to see the team they poured into for three years win a Stanley Cup in what would have been their fourth? Well, that has to make defeating Vegas last year feel pretty special indeed.

But even more than that, a team as good as Vegas is a proving ground. And as far as Spott is concerned, that Game 7 victory proved a lot—though not quite everything.

“When you’re getting through those types of teams, you have to do a lot of things right,” Spott says of Vegas. “So that’s a highlight. But I’d like to think that there’s a bigger one still to come.”

1. The Stars would score three power play goals in their next two games after this interview, so I think you can assume their mental state was quite good, indeed.

2. As an aside here: the way Spott was describing this process is exactly how a great teacher communicates with students (which isn’t surprising, given his teaching background). It can be easy to slip into “sage on the stage” mode where you take pride in how smart you sound in presenting your point to your audience. But ultimately, effective communication is rooted in understanding and empathy, even if the audience is one player making millions of dollars.