The Philadelphia Flyers have reportedly chosen their new man to run the team’s offense and power play. After a couple weeks with head coach Rick Tocchet being the only official member of the Flyers’ coaching staff — besides goaltending coach Kim Dillabaugh — he is bringing in his man from Vancouver, Jaroslav “Yogi” Svejkovsky.
Before reportedly joining the Flyers, Svejkovsky was one of the Canucks’ assistant coaches under Tocchet last season. Before that though, he was not on the bench but instead Vancouver’s skills coach for the last two years, and before even that, was down with the AHL’s Abbotsford Canucks for one season following a longer stint with the WHL’s Vancouver Giants in the same role. Basically, before joining an NHL bench, Svejkovsky was an extremely fast riser as a skills coach in the Vancouver area.
The former NHLer must have been doing a fairly good job to rise up the ranks within just a couple years, right? Going from a WHL assistant and skills coach to the NHL in just three years is impressive.
Svejkovsky was in charge of the Canucks’ offense and power play last season and should be taking the same role in Philadelphia. He will be replacing maligned coach Rocky Thompson in that role. While we of course don’t know exactly what he will be able to do with the Flyers until we’re in the middle of next season, what can we gleam from his one single season in that role for the Canucks? Let’s focus specifically on what he did for the power play, because that is obviously that is somewhere the Flyers have been historically terrible for the last few seasons. Will hiring Svejkovsky change anything?
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