The Red Deer Rebels got their guy and didn’t have to look far.
On Wednesday they lifted the interim tag and hired head coach Dave Struch full-time as the team’s bench boss.
Struch joined the Rebels on March 1 with just eight games left in the regular season following the departure of former head coach Derrick Walser. He went 3-4-1 to finish the year.
With the new designation he becomes the Rebels ninth head coach in franchise history.
He led the Rebels to a first-round playoff series victory beating the Medicine Hat Tigers in five games before the Saskatoon Blades swept them in the second round.
“Very excited to be a part of the Rebels organization and all those within it,” said Struch in a media release. “I’m looking forward to contributing to the continued success moving forward, along with the development of our players both on, and more importantly, off the ice as they prepare for their future.”
The Flin Flon, Man. native was previously the director of hockey at Notre Dame College in Wilcox, Sask. and was also the head coach of the U15 prep team before joining the Rebels.
He also played four seasons in the Western Hockey League (WHL) for the Saskatoon Blades which led him to play 14 seasons in professional hockey including a brief stint with the Calgary Flames.
Struch served in the WHL for five years as a head coach with the Blades and Regina Pats, as well as 12 years as an assistant coach with the Blades, Pats, and Everett Silvertips.
Owner, president and general manager Brent Sutter said that Struch checks off a lot of boxes in what’s important in a head coach.
“I thought the relationship he had with the staff and the way they worked together it just seemed to flow very well,” Sutter said.
“He’s someone who’s experienced in our league as a head coach and someone who wants to be successful at it. You think about his past as a head coach in the league and the tough positions he was in I think it made him a better coach that way.”
The last two times Struch served as a head coach he took over following trips to the Memorial Cup.
The first was the 2013-14 Saskatoon Blades and the second was the 2018-19 Regina Pats. That responsibility typically comes with a young roster after loading up with veteran players for a chance to lift junior hockey’s holy grail.
Sutter said because of that, this years Rebels team was arguably the best Struch has coached.
“Just because of the circumstances he was put in the last two experiences he come out of Memorial cups where the teams are depleted. They’re etooling and it takes time as we know when we hosted the 2016 Memorial Cup,” Sutter said.
“He sees the game a lot like myself in what we expect out of our practices. There’s just a lot of common shared goals in how we see the game and how we see the team play.”
Everything from conditioning to practice habits and how hard the team has to practice are among the many mindsets they share.
Ultimately, it was the right fit at the right time.
“The team was well prepared, we played hard, and he did a lot of things that we like to see a coach do,” Sutter continued.
“I know it’s a small sample size but I know Strucher. He knows our league, he knows our organization and he knows what we’re about.
“It truly is a good fit at this point in time.”