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Tortorella Sends Early Message

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By ERIK ERLENDSSON, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 17, 2008

TAMPA - When it comes to finding ways to motivate his team, John Tortorella knows how to push buttons. In his latest move, he may very well have lifted the little glass door that states "Use Only in Emergency" and firmly pushed it down.

In his tenure as Lightning coach, Tortorella has been a master of using motivational tools, including the now-famous "shut your yap" comment during the Eastern Conference finals against Philadelphia in 2004. There also was the "pressure's on them" speech before Game 3 of the 2003 first-round Stanley Cup series against Washington after being down 2-0, and again before Game 6 of the 2004 Stanley Cup Finals in Calgary.

There was the tennis-ball turnaround last year when the team responded to a light-hearted practice without pucks by winning three consecutive games and 12 of the next 16. In the early part of the 2005-06 season, Tortorella called the team in on a planned off-day following a fifth consecutive loss; however, instead of getting on the ice, the team sat in the locker room and watched Game 7 of its Stanley Cup championship series against Calgary in its entirety. The team responded with 10 wins in 12 games.

Certainly, the successful tactics grab the attention. And there have been the techniques that failed, such as trying to get inside Ray Emery's head during the 2006 playoff series with Ottawa.

This year, none of the buttons Tortorella has pushed seem to be working. He has tried the bad-cop approach during team meetings; pulled out the tennis-ball practice again; praised the team's play in losses; and called out his top players publicly. There was even the bus-trip-to-nowhere practice in New York in late October. All have failed to create the desired effect.

So after Tuesday's embarrassing loss to Colorado in which Tampa Bay played the first two periods looking like it couldn't compete against a college team, the message on the dry erase board inside the locker room said it all: "On the ice at 8 a.m."

It was clear by calling the players to the rink four hours earlier than originally scheduled Wednesday that this practice was not going to be a day of working on the power play or focusing on break-out drills. Instead, parts of practice played out like a scene from the movie "Miracle" in which players skated from one goal line to each of the forward lines and back in a drill called "Herbies," named after legendary U.S. Olympic coach Herb Brooks.

Tortorella was not available to discuss the matter after practice, but his message may have been clearer without speaking.

"It was pretty hard and everybody worked hard, but it was definitely a tough one," center and alternate captain Vinny Lecavalier said. "It is a message. We didn't like the way we played Tuesday and I've had many of those practices in my career, so ... we just have to get back on track and make sure our next game we come out ready to go."

But the grueling 45-minute skating and battling session was not the end of the day for the players. After getting out of their gear, they sat in the locker room with notebooks in hand while watching game film without the coaching staff present. Another clear-cut message: The players had to look at themselves on the film and present the coaching staff their analysis.

"Coaches are probably just wanting us to do it ourselves, so they don't hear the same voices. Look at the whole game on our own, instead of what they just picked out," center Brad Richards said of the video session while holding several notepads. "As a player, you finish a game like that, you expect to be in here."

Whether this latest attempt has any effect won't be known for some time. But it's clear Tortorella is at his wit's end trying to turn around the team.

"For as much of a hard-nosed guy Torts is perceived to be and can be ... and this is something I hope the guys understand ... this hurt John Tortorella more than it hurt the guys that actually went through the skate because for Torts, it's embarrassing," General Manager Jay Feaster said. "And for whatever he is or he isn't, he prides himself in being a guy who respects the players. To have to go through that, it's embarrassing for him.

"And yet, the point was, we only got 20 minutes of solid play from them Tuesday night so he felt the need to get the 40 minutes back Wednesday morning."

Reporter Erik Erlendsson can be reached at (813) 259-7835 or eerlendsson@tampatrib.com.

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