Patrick Williams, TheAHL.com Options Author
J.D. Forrest is coming house in the end.
The native of Auburn, N.Y., has joined the Tampa Bay Lightning group as an assistant coach with the Syracuse Crunch.
After eight seasons with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins – together with the previous 4 as their head coach, going 113-102-24-13 – his new submit places him 30 miles away from his hometown. Forrest’s nine-year enjoying profession took him by the AHL, ECHL and Europe, and after retiring in 2014 he spent a yr with USA Hockey’s Nationwide Crew Growth Program adopted by a season in Austria with EC Purple Bull Salzburg’s under-20 workforce.
Forrest known as the Lightning “one of many premier vacation spot organizations within the NHL and within the AHL” when it comes to their operations.
“It’s one of many fashions that folks look to across the league as to win,” he mentioned. “I’m actually enthusiastic about that and with the ability to be taught from totally different individuals.”
These individuals will embrace the gamers who finally start the season in Syracuse. The Tampa Bay group has remade its organizational depth chart this summer season, notably on the blue line. New Lightning signees Tobie Bisson, Derrick Pouliot and Steven Santini all spent vital time within the AHL this previous season, and nevertheless the Crunch roster shakes out, Forrest – who might be dealing with the Crunch penalty kill – and head coach Joel Bouchard ought to have robust choices amongst their defensemen.
“I’ve a number of respect for what gamers undergo,” Forrest mentioned, “how arduous it’s to get the place they wish to get, the each day endeavor of it. It may be a problem, and I’m simply there to attempt to assist and information once I can.
“Additionally, gamers are a priceless useful resource for me to be taught from. It’s such a give-and-take relationship with the coach, and I believe it begins with having that mutual respect and understanding that what they’re going by isn’t straightforward. As an assistant, particularly, working with the ‘D,’ it’s a little bit workforce inside a workforce, and people relationships get very tight.”
Working with Bouchard might be one other alternative for studying as nicely. The 2 have spent this summer season attending to know one another higher, exchanging concepts and speaking hockey.
“I’m there to assist Joel with the areas that he needs assist in,” Forrest continued. “He’s been nice speaking with me. He’s laid out some expectations – and I do know they’re excessive in Syracuse – persevering with to construct on what he started in his first yr.
“I’m in a help position now, and I believe I may also help in that space.”
Forrest’s enjoying profession put him at varied locations within the pecking order, a journey that started when he left Auburn to affix the USNTDP’s first under-18 workforce in 1997. He was drafted by Carolina in 2000, and spent 4 seasons as a standout defenseman at Boston School, the place he gained a nationwide championship as a freshman. His 10-year professional profession included 35 video games within the AHL, however was spent largely in Europe with turns in Finland, Switzerland, Sweden and Germany.
“It’s been a very long time since I’ve lived round house,” Forrest mentioned, “We’re actually excited. I perceive the connection to the group, and the possession has been so concerned in making it part of the material of Syracuse and the higher Central New York space.
“I’m simply trying to contribute to that.”
TheAHL.com options author Patrick Williams has been on the American Hockey League beat for almost twenty years for shops together with NHL.com, Sportsnet, TSN, The Hockey Information, SiriusXM NHL Community Radio and SLAM! Sports activities, and was most not too long ago the co-host of The Hockey Information On The ‘A’ podcast. He was the recipient of the AHL’s James H. Ellery Memorial Award for his excellent protection of the league in 2016.
