Marc Johnstone, a forward with the Penguins' Wilkes-Barre/Scranton AHL affiliate, remembers Dan Muse being "a little bit of everything" when Muse was his coach with the USHL's Chicago Steel in 2015-17.
"He was a player's coach," Johnstone recalled for me in an interview Friday. "But he expected a lot of his players, and I think we all responded really well. I mean, you can't complain if you win a championship together."
Muse, hired as the Penguins' 23rd head coach this week, led the Steel to the franchise's first Clark Cup championship in his second year, with Johnstone serving as his captain.
Johnstone recalled something Muse did at the start of that year as something that set the tone.
"He had us all over at the house, a team gathering," Johnstone told me. "It was pretty cool. He let us see his family and everything. And he just told us what his expectations were. He thought we could win right from the beginning of the season and, when he put that in our minds, we started to believe. And then things turn out that same exact way as he expected."
The Steel were dominant throughout the season, and finished the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference with a 38-17-2-3 record. But Johnstone said that they had an "uncharacteristic" weekend along the way, losing two games. And he remembers Muse "ripped into" the group in response.
"He was saying that we were losing our attention to detail, and it doesn't work if we lose focus," Muse said. "It was just constant, like you can't forget to do the simple, easy things, the everyday things, which was drilled into our minds."
That attention to detail is something that Johnstone remembers the most.
"We did a ton of video," Johnstone said. "It was all really helpful. We went into the game knowing how it was going to play out, so it was really nice and easy. And he made practices harder than the games, which is a cliche, but when it actually happens then the games feel easy for you and your team."
The attention to detail, the grueling practices and high standards had Muse "pretty hard on us," Johnstone said. But Muse's straightforwardness with expectations, and the efforts he made to get to know his players on a personal level had Muse popular with his players despite the hard nature.
"Everyone liked him, respected him, and just wanted to win for him," Johnstone said. "He was just a galvanizing part of the team."
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THE ASYLUM
Taylor Haase
10:15 pm - 06.06.2025Buffalo, N.Y.Johnstone: Muse a 'galvanizing' coach
Marc Johnstone, a forward with the Penguins' Wilkes-Barre/Scranton AHL affiliate, remembers Dan Muse being "a little bit of everything" when Muse was his coach with the USHL's Chicago Steel in 2015-17.
"He was a player's coach," Johnstone recalled for me in an interview Friday. "But he expected a lot of his players, and I think we all responded really well. I mean, you can't complain if you win a championship together."
Muse, hired as the Penguins' 23rd head coach this week, led the Steel to the franchise's first Clark Cup championship in his second year, with Johnstone serving as his captain.
Johnstone recalled something Muse did at the start of that year as something that set the tone.
"He had us all over at the house, a team gathering," Johnstone told me. "It was pretty cool. He let us see his family and everything. And he just told us what his expectations were. He thought we could win right from the beginning of the season and, when he put that in our minds, we started to believe. And then things turn out that same exact way as he expected."
The Steel were dominant throughout the season, and finished the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference with a 38-17-2-3 record. But Johnstone said that they had an "uncharacteristic" weekend along the way, losing two games. And he remembers Muse "ripped into" the group in response.
"He was saying that we were losing our attention to detail, and it doesn't work if we lose focus," Muse said. "It was just constant, like you can't forget to do the simple, easy things, the everyday things, which was drilled into our minds."
That attention to detail is something that Johnstone remembers the most.
"We did a ton of video," Johnstone said. "It was all really helpful. We went into the game knowing how it was going to play out, so it was really nice and easy. And he made practices harder than the games, which is a cliche, but when it actually happens then the games feel easy for you and your team."
The attention to detail, the grueling practices and high standards had Muse "pretty hard on us," Johnstone said. But Muse's straightforwardness with expectations, and the efforts he made to get to know his players on a personal level had Muse popular with his players despite the hard nature.
"Everyone liked him, respected him, and just wanted to win for him," Johnstone said. "He was just a galvanizing part of the team."
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