HUMBOLDT 鈥� A Western Hockey League head coach who鈥檚 originally from Humboldt has been awarded that league鈥檚 coach of the year award.
Brad Lauer, who鈥檚 with the Edmonton Oil Kings, said he鈥檚 honoured yet humbled to receive the Dunc McCallum Memorial Trophy, which is awarded by a vote of the WHL鈥檚 coaches and general managers.
鈥淚've been fortunate enough to have good players and have a great staff, so when you receive an award like this, it's not just an individual award for me,鈥� he said.
鈥淚 think it shows what our organization has done this season. There's a lot of guys to give credit to.鈥�
The award was announced May 7. Lauer, who represented the WHL鈥檚 eastern conference, was nominated along with Dennis Williams of the western conference鈥檚 Everett Silvertips.
Lauer is now a nominee for the Canadian Hockey League鈥檚 Sofina Brian Kilrea Coach of the Year award.
In the 2019-20 season, Lauer led the Oil Kings to a WHL Central Division-best record of 42-12-6-4 (94 points). Since he became head coach in June 2018, the Oil Kings have a record of 84-30-10-8 across 132 WHL regular season games.
The head coach said while reviewing the last season, he liked the way his team competed in every game and that it was nice to see the players believe in and execute the team鈥檚 systems. He said with travel demands within the league, it can be hard for a team to stay consistent.
鈥淥ur kids, they really stayed focused. They were in a lot of games that if we didn鈥檛 win then, we at least got a point out of them,鈥� he said.
鈥淲e were just competitive for a lot of nights and that's a credit to our players for understanding what we wanted them to do.鈥�
The seeds for a successful 2019-20 season started in the 2018-19 season.
Lauer had taken over a team that placed 22nd place overall within the regular 2017-18 season. The league has 22 teams. In 2016-17, they were 19th overall in the regular season.
The head coach hired a new assistant coach, Luke Pierce, and a new video coach. Lauer was coaching a young team that year.
The Oil Kings ended up placing fifth overall during the 2018-19 regular season and made it to the Eastern Conference final in the playoffs.
Many of the players from that season returned.
鈥淭hey knew the expectations, they knew what we expected,鈥� Lauer said. 鈥淭he way we practice, the way we do things is very professional and our guys have done a really good job of being focused, being motivated and excited to come to the rink every day to play and give us their best.鈥�
Lauer said he still has friends and family in Humboldt and tries to make it back in the summer.
For aspiring hockey players in his hometown, Lauer said the advice he would give to them is to put the work in. He said there鈥檚 a lot of people that could probably have made it to the NHL but didn鈥檛 because they didn鈥檛 work hard enough, while others that people wouldn鈥檛 have guessed would make it to the NHL did because they did put in the effort.
鈥淚t's something that doesn't matter what you do in life, you鈥檝e got to be willing to work, sacrifice and do things right.鈥�
