Grizzlys name new assistant coach

The Grizzlys will have another helping hand in the den, after naming a new assistant coach for the upcoming season.

Blake Wildeman, most recently the associate coach of the Okotoks Bisons Junior B hockey team and who previously coached Minor Midget AAA and Bantam AAA, will join Olds' Junior A program this fall.

"In the world of coaching, it's not all that often that you find coaches that have bypassed the ceiling of the level they played," said Wildeman, who played in the Heritage league, but never cracked a Junior A lineup. "For me it was a no brainer. It's an opportunity to take what I want to do in life to the next level."

Wildeman, who works for Skillz SSC, a hockey development centre in Calgary and is a professional treadmill skating instructor, said that while he never played Junior A, he's been coaching and teaching the game for most of his adult life now and feels up to the challenge.

"It's still a game where we want to put the black disc in the white net more than the other team," he said.

Wildeman hopes to spend the first year absorbing whatever he can from newly appointed head coach Adam Redmond, and associate coach Joe Murphy, "hopefully, like a sponge, and learn as much as I possibly can."

"Everybody has their own style, and you kind of steal from other guys along the way, and see how they do things and make it your own," he said.

Redmond said Wildeman will take on the role as the "players' coach," working on team building and acting as a liaison with the main coaching staff.

"He's good with the kids," said Redmond. "He's going to be the guy the boys can lean on."

In this role, Wildeman said he would spend less time on the technical or disciplinary sides and be more involved with the players as a friend and teacher.

"Like a big brother or that fun uncle ñ if you're having an issue they can go and talk to me," he said. "That intermediary, go-between kind of guy, that's a friendly face, and is always gonna just listen."

Wildeman hails from Okotoks and played Junior B hockey in Cochrane and Stavely, but like Redmond (who was previously an assistant coach for the Grizzlys), as well as Murphy (a Grizzlys alumnus), Wildeman also has an Olds connection: he graduated from Olds College with a diploma in Land Acquisition and Management.

"I love Olds. It's a great community," said Wildeman. "Part of my mandate as well is to be involved with the community Ö to hopefully re-engage the community and get everybody feeling good and coming back to the rink.

"Not that that wasn't happening in the past, we just want to take it to the next level, and kick-start this whole thing over again for everybody."