One year playing for Lemaire had huge impact on Souray

By Michael Russo, Star Tribune

Last update: October 10, 2007 - 11:51 PM

Sheldon Souray only spent one season with Jacques Lemaire as his coach.

During Souray's rookie year in 1997-98, the New Jersey Devils coach often scratched Souray, snapped at him after poorly executed drills and stared him down any time he missed the net.

Think Souray hated Lemaire?

"Of all the guys in my hockey career, he is the biggest influence," Souray said Wednesday, before his Edmonton Oilers lost to Lemaire's Wild 2-0 at Xcel Energy Center. "Any kind of strides I've made as a player, he's at the root of them all."

Souray, 31, signed a five-year, $27 million deal with Edmonton in July, having developed into arguably the NHL's most feared power-play pointman. Last season in Montreal, he set an NHL record for defensemen by scoring 19 goals on the man advantage.

"Jacques was hard on me, but positive," said Souray, who had a career-high 26 goals and 38 assists last season. "He would sit me out of games for saying I could do way more. I respected him so much that I wanted to play well for him. That's his reputation around everywhere.

"He's tough on a lot of guys, but he gets results because he really cares about making you a better player. He sees everybody's capabilities, and he has a way of bringing those out."

After every practice, Lemaire made Souray flip 100 pucks into a milk crate to soften his hands.

"I couldn't leave the ice until every puck was in, and when you have hands of cement, it takes a little while," Souray said, laughing. "One time, we were doing a drill where ... [the defensemen] would come in as the late guy. I couldn't get the timing down right. I just didn't have it. He stopped practice and screamed, 'This kid has no timing.'

"He made an example of me, but I didn't take it like he was picking on me. It made me want to do that drill right.

"He also always said, 'If you don't hit the net, you won't play in big situations.' In practice, if I missed the net, I wouldn't even look over to where he was because I knew I was getting eyeballed. The pressure was on all the time with him, but that's what it took."

Souray said he struggled dramatically when Lemaire left New Jersey.

"I felt like I was losing my best friend, and it was weird because I don't know if I said more than 50 words to Jacques," Souray said. "But I had that coach-player relationship where the respect I had for him was that enormous.

"He had a way of pushing the right buttons with me. Whatever he was doing, I never questioned, and you can't say that about every coach."

Lemaire, flattered, said: "He was a young guy that was searching for his game, but he's turned out to be good. I never thought he would be this good of a scorer, but he's a threat every time he gets the puck."

Concern for Blake

Wild winger Mark Parrish, who lived and played with fellow Minnesotan Jason Blake on the New York Islanders, called the second he saw Monday that the Toronto forward from Moorhead was diagnosed with a highly treatable form of leukemia.

"I had to rewind it thinking, 'God, I hope I didn't read that right,' " Parrish said. "I'm sure he's going to take this just like anything in his life -- head-on with a don't-quit attitude."

Michael Russo • mrusso@startribune.com

Recent Minnesota Wild stories

Kiprusoff's 38 saves, Iginla's 2 goals give Calgary a 5-2 win over Maple Leafs - October 10, 2007

Kiprusoff's 38 saves, Iginla's 2 goals give Calgary a 5-2 win over Maple Leafs - Jarome Iginla scored two goals and Miikka Kiprusoff made 38 saves and the Calgary Flames earned a 5-2 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday night. More