CANTLON’S CORNER: WOLF PACK OFF SEASON VOLUME 4 PART ONE 

BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings

HARTFORD, CT – So much going on in hockey that occasionally you need some time to reflect in order to get your thoughts in order. This was a week like that.

GERNANDER FIRING

It was tough thinking about the fact that Ken Gernander will be no longer be the face of Hartford Wolf Pack hockey.

This is no small matter. It’s a Titanic-sized earthquake that split the road down the middle in the magnitude of its stature. The franchise will have his jersey snuggly hanging from the rafters to remind the fans what was, and has been. People truly need to appreciate what a titan Gernander became in Connecticut’s capitol city. That description would likely make him cringe as Gernander always had a very self-effacing demeanor. It may make him uncomfortable but is undeniably true.

Gernander bled Wolf Pack red, white and blue every day.

Arriving at practice one day wearing another a hat for another NHL team did not sit well with the former #12. He excoriated me on it. Gernander was true and loyal in a work environment where that’s a rare and disappearing commodity. It was Ken Gernander to the core.

“G” was a true captain who led the ’99-’00 team to the franchise’s only Calder Cup title, something he cherishes greatly. His leadership was like the proverbial pebble thrown into the water. The ripples he put out truly went out in all directions.

PJ Stock, one of the most beloved and colorful Wolf Pack players of all time often said that in his playing days, whether it was in New York, Montreal, Boston or Philadelphia, that when the team he was on was going through a tough patch he would recall and use a Ken Gernander speech to help rally the team in the locker room.

In the world of sports, that’s the ultimate sign of respect.

In his first season, Gernander valiantly played, unbeknown to him at the time, with a blood clot courtesy of a slash to the back of the leg that traveled to his chest. It caused an embolism-quite the dangerous medical condition.

“I will never, ever forget him lying on that training table,” former teammate and still a close friend, Todd Hall said. “Watching Timmy Mac (trainer Tim Macre) working on him is still one of the few times in my life I was scared watching him in that condition. It still sends shivers down my spine. He played a game in that condition (in Saint John’s). If he could have, he would have done so again.”

Gernander played with a broken foot in another series and will never forget John Paddock winking and saying, “That’s the reason he is the captain here.”

Gernander is a man of strong personal character and that’s not some worn out cliché. It is who he truly he is.

Many a coach drop f-bombs like there saying, “Hello.” You could count on one hand the number of times in 20 years you ever heard Gernander drop one. When he did, you knew that was the indication of how angry he was. He upbraided a well-respected staff member one-day last year when he let go a slew of profanities. He stopped the interview to do so – that’s who Ken Gernander is.

As for the future, “G” must consider more than just himself in making whatever decision he’s going to about his future. “G” was referring to his wife Kerby, as well as his eldest daughter, McKenna, who’s heading off for her freshmen year at Nichols College. McKenna is held in high regard in her own right by the Hartford Junior Wolf Pack organization. Gernander’s son, Micah, is entering high school as is his other daughter, Miranda. That side of the hockey equation, the side neither seen nor understood by fans, has been impacted by his firing.

Gernander suffered another medical setback after the disastrous Whale Bowl game at Rentschler Field against the Providence Bruins. “G” looked like Casper the Friendly Ghost in the post-game interview scaring the reporting crew around him, but he soldiered on amazingly.

During the tumultuous times of the short-lived and bankrupt Connecticut Whale days, Gernander related a story that related to how he was raised.

His father Bob, a long-time Dallas Stars Pro Scout, in his early days, wound up working for an owner of a junior hockey team. The owner had graduated from the Bernie Madoff School of Economics. His father, despite having children to feed, would not work for such a person, so he quit. It made a strong impression to Gernander on how to conduct oneself and he always did so with integrity.

Clearly, the magic of the Wolf Pack franchise has slipped. The team missed the playoffs in four of the last five years after going to the postseason for 14 straight seasons.

Gernander got caught in a changing business and athletic cycle. On the business side, the salary cap rules included and affected everyone, even at the AHL level. Poor draft decisions, including trading top picks by the parent New York Rangers affected the roster Gernander was handed. The twists and turns in so many directions became more of a test of his job. He avoided mentally snapping and seemed always able to weather the storms.

The professional athlete has changed dramatically over the last five years. Many of them who had zero professional experience questioned his ability to lead a team since his career was predominately in the AHL and only a total of 27 games in the NHL (12 regular season games and 15 in the playoffs). He didn’t have the resume that his assistants, like J.J. Daigneault, who’s now an assistant coach for the Montreal Canadiens or Ulf Samuelsson, now the head coach in Charlotte with the Checkers.

Dale Wiese, now with the Philadelphia Flyers, and a former player under Gernander, was NEVER at a loss for words. In one conversation about Gernander’s jersey, which hangs in the rafters, was pointed out to him, Weise said, “They don’t retire your number because you did nothing, and have no brains about hockey.”

How Gernander conducted himself as a captain and ambassador for Hartford and the sport of hockey was perfect. After 25 years of covering the sport, Gernander personified all that was good about the sport on and off the ice.

His induction ceremony into the AHL Hall of Fame was also a significant milestone. In his speech, Gernander referenced, though not by name, his friend, and teammate Todd Hall. When Hall’s contract was not renewed, it was Gernander who was more upset by it than Hall was. “G’s” wife Kerby told the story of a parking attendant who referred to him as Kerby’s husband. A wonderfully kind gesture in which you were being honored to honor her.

He didn’t forget those who were important.

This season, a coach who sports a .579 career winning percentage, saw his team limp to a league and franchise-worst record and a .365 winning percentage. It ate him alive. The witty coach was often left muttering, grumbling and completely out of sorts all season. A pertinent observation after yet another disheartening loss, Gernander lamented that “players just stubbornly go off and do their own thing after a solid week of practice.”

His “students” stopped paying attention to him and it unraveled from the beginning to end of the 2016-17 season.

He had a veteran, Marek Hrivik, in the middle of a losing streak said when asked what will take to turn things around, ‘We have plenty of time in the season. We have the talent here to do it.”

For a five-year veteran to say that after witnessing similar horrible stretches to Wolf Pack in the past three to four seasons, it became immediately obvious this team was doomed. If your top center utters a phrase like that, for a competitor like Gernander, all you’re left with is banging your head against the glass.

Gernander made his share of mistakes. Among them, keeping rookie John Gilmour on defense instead of sending him to Greenville. Gilmour suffered a minus-39 season and was a big problem. He tried not to be negative with his players, but it went to no avail as they still didn’t respond. He also had no control when the team’s most valuable assets at the start of the season, goaltenders Magnus Hellberg and Mackenzie Skapski had horrendous starts to their respective seasons.

Gernander may also have been a victim of the changing of the guard in New York. When Glen Sather’s retired and Jeff Gorton’s ascension to the GM spot, and the addition of a new and young rising front office star in Chris Drury. They all had an effect.

‘I wasn’t Jeff Gorton’s guy,” he said succinctly. It was a rumor for years that he would get canned, but it was now former GM Jim Schoenfeld who was always protecting his protégé in the fiefdom that is Ranger-land. Like it or not, in the world of MSG, this is how the game is played. Gernander was loyal too because Schoenfeld genuinely admired his tenacity.

Drury, not Schoenfeld, handled the exit interviews in Hartford for the first time. That was a clear sign that a changing of the guard was imminent this summer.

Gernander’s replacement will need to be an individual who can best relate to these prospects, even though the vast majority of them, based on their performance, with the possible exception of Nicklas Jensen, Chris Summers, and Matt Carey, failed to show any real progress last season.

Could the next Head Coach be the current assistant, Keith McCambridge? He was just hired last year and came with previous AHL experience. It could also turn out to be either current Ranger assistant coach Scott Arniel or even former New Haven Nighthawk, Darryl Williams. Both have head coaching experience hired as they would know the thinking of Alain Vigneault or they could go outside the organization and hire a Gorton or Drury guy.

Whoever gets the nod they will have quite a bit of work ahead to make the Wolf Pack competitive and have to fill some mighty big skates here in Hartford.

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