Report: Calgary Flames hire Marc Savard as assistant coach

It appears that the Calgary Flames are almost finished rounding out their coaching staff. On Thursday night, The Hockey News’ Tony Ferrari reported that the Flames have hired former player Marc Savard as an assistant coach. (The report was subsequently confirmed by Sportsnet’s Jeff Marek.)

Per Ferrari, Savard will be responsible for the Flames’ forwards and power play.

Savard was most recently the head coach of the Ontario Hockey League’s Windsor Spitfires for the past two seasons. Prior to that, he was an assistant coach with the St. Louis Blues.

But Savard is better known by hockey fans for his distinguished, albeit concussion-shortened, playing career. He played 807 games split between the NY Rangers, Flames, Atlanta and Boston. His tenure with the Flames ended tumultuously; amidst a feud with head coach Greg Gilbert, he was traded to the Thrashers in exchange for Russian prospect Ruslan Zainullin.

His career ended prematurely during the 2010-11 season due to complications following a couple nasty hits – first at the hands of Matt Cooke in 2009-10 and another from Matt Hunwick the following season. Despite missing the entire playoff run due to his injuries, his name was engraved on the Stanley Cup by the Bruins in 2011.

Savard was a savvy, creative offensive player whose offensive numbers pre-injury were pretty impressive. When he was with the Flames, he was a very smart centre whose offensive numbers were good, but not quite Jarome Iginla good. But hey, plenty of very good players are in that category.

While we’re waiting on an announcement from the club the new members of the coaching staff, reports from Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman and Pat Steinberg suggest that assistant coach Cail MacLean and goaltending coach Jason LaBarbera are returning, and will be joined by former Nashville Predators assistant Dan Lambert. Presumably, Savard’s addition would round out the staff, but that’s yet to be made official.