Laxdal up for new challenge with Firebirds

Patrick Williams, TheAHL.com Features Writer

Derek Laxdal fell just short of championships as head coach of the Texas Stars in 2018 and as an assistant with the Dallas Stars in 2020. The Coachella Valley Firebirds have come up empty in back-to-back Finals.

Maybe this a combination that can put a Calder Cup championship banner in the Acrisure Arena rafters.

Laxdal won the Calder Cup as a New York Islanders prospect with the Springfield Indians in 1990. With the Stars organization, he captured an ECHL title as a head coach in Idaho in 2007 and spent six seasons leading Texas, leading the AHL club to Game 7 of the Finals in 2018. And after being promoted to Dallas during the 2019-20 season, he helped the big club reach the Stanley Cup Final that summer.

As a junior head coach, he won two Western Hockey League titles and the 2014 Memorial Cup with Edmonton, and guided Oshawa to the Ontario Hockey League finals while winning coach of the year honors last season.

Laxdal can win and he can develop talent – two things that he has done over and over throughout his various stops in a coaching career that began in 2001.

Laxdal was hired by the Seattle Kraken on July 5 as their new AHL head coach amid a hectic opening week of free agency that saw dramatic changes sweep the Coachella Valley roster barely a week after their season had ended with a Game 6 loss to Hershey in the Calder Cup Finals.

A visit to the Firebirds’ base in Palm Desert, Calif., left Laxdal impressed. Acrisure Arena, which opened in December 2022, regularly hosts large crowds and features an attached practice facility that could rival the best anywhere in hockey.

“One of the things I really see is the set-up is all-world,” Laxdal said. “The arena, the practice arena, the facility, the weight room, just the way they’ve set everything up. I think they’ve hit a home run.”

The fan support in the Coachella Valley also stands out. The Firebirds averaged nearly 8,500 fans per game over their first two seasons in the desert.

“You look at the association with Palm Springs and Palm Desert and Indio, the fans have really taken to the Firebirds,” Laxdal noted. “It’s really become their team, and they’ve really jumped on board. The expectations are very high.”

After two seasons of relative stability, this season’s Firebirds roster will have a markedly different look. Andrew Poturalski, Kole Lind, Jimmy Schuldt, Cameron Hughes, Ville Petman and Peetro Seppala – all mainstays each of the last two years – have moved on. Depending on how Seattle’s opening-night roster settles out, more players from last June’s run to the Finals could stick with the Kraken.

Having made four trips to the NHL Draft now, the Kraken have accumulated prospects who are ready to play and develop with Coachella Valley. Expect the Firebirds to take on a younger, more development-oriented flavor.

After an inaugural season stocked largely by free-agent signings, last season’s Firebirds showed the first signs of transitioning to a more traditional type of AHL roster, as Seattle draft picks like Shane Wright, Ryan Winterton and Ville Ottavainen turned pro.

The Kraken are counting on Laxdal to orchestrate that shift, just as Dan Bylsma and his staff helped the Firebirds in their launch two years ago. And Laxdal has shown that he can handle change. For as much stability as he has had in his coaching career, his return to junior with Oshawa in 2022 showed that he could move to something unfamiliar. Laxdal, a Manitoba native, had no connection to the OHL before taking the Oshawa job. But he adapted quickly, learning a new league and taking on a role as general manager as well.

The considerably less-demanding travel schedule in the OHL afforded Laxdal much more practice time with his players. He also acknowledged that after years of working with pros, including NHL players, he had to prioritize patience with his young players.

“It was an eye-opener,” said the 58-year-old Laxdal. “I really enjoyed my time going back to junior. The new-age player has changed. They want to know more. They want more information, building relationships, building that family atmosphere.”

Going to Dallas as an assistant also presented a different wrinkle for Laxdal, who had not been in an assistant role since 2003 in the old Central Hockey League. He worked for a hockey fixture in Rick Bowness, something that offered another learning opportunity.

“It really taught me to take a step back, listen, and take in the information… digest it a little bit before you make a decision,” said Laxdal, whose fellow assistants in Dallas were now-Hershey head coach Todd Nelson and AHL Hall of Famer John Stevens. “I think it really allowed me to take a step in my maturity as a coach going from Texas to Dallas.”

Laxdal admits he is a different coach than the one who departed Cedar Park five years ago.

“I think every day presents a new challenge,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what league you’re in. You’re a problem-solver.”