Lemaire's questions answered, he'll stay

Truth is, this wasn't just like other years. Since the Wild started, coach Jacques Lemaire and Doug Risebrough would meet once the season ended, hashing out the past season, looking ahead to the next.

This time it was different. Lemaire, the only man to coach the Wild, was wavering. Would he come back? Did he want to? Were his coaching methods still relevant?

Risebrough knew this as he headed to Tampa to talk to Lemaire. The Wild's president and general manager wasn't exactly thinking in what-if terms -- What would he do if Lemaire didn't come back? -- but he knew the meeting was an important one.

"I had to think about it more than ever," Risebrough said. "It wasn't what we'll do if he leaves. It was more, what does Jacques need to hear?"

Whatever it was, it was heard loud and clear, and Lemaire is returning to coach the Wild for an eighth season, the team announced Saturday.

But the dynamics of the three days of organizational meetings in Tampa were different than in past meetings. Lemaire has 11 Stanley Cup rings, won as a player, as a member of a front office and as a coach. Most men with that track record wouldn't admit to doubts, wouldn't want to listen to others assess his style. And yet that's exactly what he wanted last week, and what he got.

"Maybe I'm different than the majority of coaches," Lemaire said. "I feel secure, and feeling secure makes me do the right things. ... When I came to Minnesota, I said I want to work with a GM that I know, that he knows me, he knows how I work, because I want to work together."

So Lemaire went to Florida to find out what Risebrough thought about his coaching style and whether he was satisfied with his work, wanting suggestions on how to improve, wanting ideas.

Wanting, frankly, reassurance.

He got all of that, and more. Lemaire, who went from Tampa to his off-season home in Palmetto to do a little babysitting for his newest grandchild, sounded reborn himself.

"I have to say it's one of the best meetings I had with Doug since I've been here," Lemaire said. "Because I need him to reinforce, maybe, what I was thinking."

Said Risebrough: "It was the most conversation Jacques and I had about him and I, and how things were going, what we were trying to accomplish. For me, nothing had changed. I felt as strongly about Jacques coming back as I did in hiring him."

And Lemaire's willingness to listen?

"It's a statement of a coach who accepts responsibility," Risebrough said. "He had frustration, not necessarily related to any of the players, as with his job to motivate some of the players. And at times he wasn't sure he was getting that."

Risebrough's message? Some of the responsibility is on the players, he told his coach. "And he said, 'I know, but that's not how I want to think,'" Risebrough said.

Not that there aren't steps that need to be taken. Risebrough said after the season ended that having a bevy of players in the final year of their contract didn't make Lemaire's job any easier.

And another first-round playoff exit -- to a Colorado team that was subsequently swept in the second round -- just added to the frustration.

Lemaire said he'd rather still be coaching than sitting in the Florida sun. He thought the 2007-08 team was the most talented Wild team he'd had and he had expected more. And those stretches last season when the team struggled, both to win and to play together? Tough to take.

"That really affected me, because I feel my forte is to get them to play as a team," Lemaire said. "I was frustrated because I felt I'm not doing my job. This is my job to get them to play good, make my boss happy. I didn't have that satisfaction."

So what's next? If the two came to any agreements on personnel, Lemaire wouldn't say. He did say that future success will depend on the Wild's group of young players. He said he wants Pierre-Marc Bouchard to elevate his game 15 to 20 percent. He said he wants more out of Mikko Koivu and Brent Burns and James Sheppard.

He said he looks forward to coaching a team with a roster that will change a lot from last season. Lemaire is happy, and he'll come back to Minnesota in the fall refreshed.