Don Waddell
Don Waddell
Donald Douglas Waddellis the former, and last President of the Atlanta Thrashers and a former professional ice hockey defenseman. He is currently President of Gale Force Sports & Entertainment, parent company of the Carolina Hurricanes of the National Hockey League...
coaches few fired franchise good lose soon teams tend
I told him that 3 1/2 years with one franchise is pretty good in today's world. Coaches tend to get fired as soon as teams lose a few games.
behind emotion emotions expect game goes happen players realize scenes
It's very disappointing. Sometimes players in the emotion of the game don't realize everything that goes on behind the scenes that need to happen to make these tournaments happen. As a player, I don't expect them to know that.
hockey people pressure top tremendous usa
It's very disappointing, because the people at USA Hockey do a tremendous job. There is a lot of pressure on people. The top people at USA Hockey are volunteers.
best dressed felt four home practical remain ryan
It's not practical to have four goaltenders dressed for practice, so we felt it best to have Ryan remain at home and be available.
ability advantage affect either finish mostly pick players playoffs positively team until wait year
It's to everybody's advantage if we could just wait until the playoffs are over or mostly over. That way you don't want to affect any player's ability with their team right now either positively or negatively. If the players could finish the year out and then we could pick the team that would be ideal.
everybody guy jump oldest talking tournament
The oldest guy in the tournament was one of our better players. Unfortunately not everybody had the jump that he had. If we did, we'd probably be talking about something differently.
continues country difficult extremely hockey means pool process selection statement talent terrific united united-states
The selection process was an extremely difficult one and that's a terrific statement for hockey in the United States. It means our talent pool in this country continues to grow.
best guy oldest tournament
Probably our oldest guy in the tournament was one of our best players.
best game missed nervous prepared run seen team year
It was the right thing to do at this time. I'm not nervous about it because I'm around our team so much and I know our team very well. I've seen every game this year and I haven't missed anything, so I feel like short-term I'm best prepared to run the bench.
legal patterns
Some of his patterns come in legal and some come in illegal.
amateur best past scouts seen
One of our scouts said he was the best amateur goalie he had seen in the past 10 years.
confident excited franchise group next players poised step taking
We're excited about where this franchise is headed. I'm very confident in the group of players we've put together. We're taking it one step at a time. But this franchise is poised to take the next step, and we will take the next step.
confident few follow good next ok paperwork reported send within
We're confident that it'll be reported back to us within the next 24 hours. Once they OK it, they'll just send us an e-mail immediately, and then the paperwork will follow in a few days. Once we get that, he'll be good to go.
change decision guys injury maybe named performed positions roll ryan team three today wish
We made a decision back in December. We all wish we could make this decision today on your whole team because maybe some other positions would change also. Ryan has come back from his injury and has performed very well, but we're very comfortable with the three guys we've named and we're going to roll with them.