Thoughts On Cary Eades

In case you missed it, UND announced last week that they would not be renewing the contract of assistant coach Cary Eades. Eades, who played at UND, had been an assistant for Dave Hakstol each year the latter was the head coach at UND and prior to the 2006-07 season was named the school’s associate head coach.

Eades helped UND to 2 WCHA regular season titles, 4 WCHA postseason titles and 5 Frozen Four appearances in his 8 years with Hakstol. In a statement, Hakstol said the reason for the change was “a need to redefine and restructure the roles and duties” within the coaching staff. Eades was the coach of the defensemen and was also the recruiting coordinator.

Brad Schlossman of the Grand Forks Herald said that his first thought was perhaps Hakstol wanted a defenseman to coach the defensemen, which makes sense initially, but Eades has done fantastic work with the defensemen in his time at UND. Defensemen of course normally develop later than forwards, and just in the last few years Taylor Chorney, Chay Genoway and Ben Blood have been first team All-Americans. Eades’s work with Genoway was especially impressive, as he went from just another forward to the best defenseman in the country.

As far as recruiting goes, UND has lost some recruits lately to the CHL (and might lose one more in Seth Jones) but recently both Miles Koules and Stefan Matteau’s decisions were based on ice time and Matteau specifically wanted to play for his father. That UND has assembled so much talent that a recruit like Koules isn’t sure that he’d get enough ice time (of course, that’s his reasoning. I’m sure however much money got added to his family’s bank account helped) should hardly be a knock against Eades.

Eades, no doubt, will be fine. He’s already had interest from other jobs and it’s possible there will be a head gig available for him to take, and his contract not being renewed will let him take the job free of any guilt that might arise from feelings that he was abandoning the program. Whatever happens, the next assistant coach will have some big shoes to fill, but as I have said for his entire tenure, Sioux fans should trust in the Hak.