Barry Melrose

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Barry Melrose (born July 15, 1956 in Kelvington, Saskatchewan) has been a hockey player, coach, and is currently a commentator for ESPN.

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[edit] Professional Career

Melrose began his hockey career as a defenseman in the WCHL with the Kamloops Chiefs in 1974, eventually working his way up to the Cincinnati Stingers of the WHA. Following the demise of the WHA and its subsequent absorption into the NHL, Melrose joined the Winnipeg Jets for the 1979-80 season.

The remainder of his playing career saw Melrose bounce from team to team, being sent to the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Detroit Red Wings and their assorted AHL affiliates. Melrose spent his final season playing with the Adirondack Red Wings of the AHL in 1986-87. During his playing career, Melrose scored a mere 65 points between his NHL and WHA teams, but amassed over 1,000 penalty minutes.

In an interview with ESPN, Melrose said he played in 314 NHL games, while ESPN claimed it was 300.

[edit] Coaching Career

Following his playing career, Melrose took to coaching. His first coaching position saw him helming the Medicine Hat Tigers and then the Seattle Thunderbirds of the WHL. In 1989, Melrose was hired to coach his old team, the Adirondack Red Wings. He successfully led the minor league franchise to a Calder Cup victory over the St. John's Maple Leafs in the 1991-92 season.

Following that season, Melrose was hired to be the coach of the NHL's Los Angeles Kings. The team included stars like Wayne Gretzky, Jari Kurri, Luc Robitaille, Tomas Sandstrom, Rob Blake, Marty McSorley and Paul Coffey. However, Gretzky's back injury and Coffey's trade to the Detroit Red Wings made for a turbulent season, especially in midseason, and only in the last few months did the Kings clinch a playoff spot. However, it was a different story in the postseason as the Kings beat three higher seeded teams; scoring an amazing 33 goals against the Calgary Flames, beating the Smythe Division winners and Pat Quinn-coached Vancouver Canucks, and then prevailing in seven games against the heavily favoured Toronto Maple Leafs coached by Pat Burns and led by superstar Doug Gilmour. Reaching the Stanley Cup finals, they lost to the Montreal Canadiens. During that time, Melrose was called "the greatest coach I ever played for" by Gretzky.

During the 1993-94 season, Melrose coached the Western Conference team at the midseason All-Star Game. However, the team ended up out of the playoffs. Eventually, Melrose fell out of favor with star Gretzky and some believe he was fired at Gretzky's behest.

    Melrose was also a part owner of the Adirondack Frostbite (formerly the Adirondack Icehawks) of the UHL prior to the team's folding in 2006.

    [edit] ESPN

    After his coaching stint, Melrose was hired to be a hockey commentator with cable sports network ESPN (and later ABC when that network televised NHL games). Melrose formerly worked as a studio analyst along with John Saunders and currently does hockey analysis for SportsCenter and ESPNEWS. He is also the lead color analyst for ESPN's college hockey coverage (ESPN itself only produces some of these games), which includes a game of the week on ESPNU, and blanket coverage of the NCAA Division I Tournament. Melrose has his own segment weekly during hockey season on SportsCenter known as Barry's Best, where he names his top goals, saves, and hits from the games that evening.

    [edit] Trivia

    Melrose currently resides in Glens Falls, New York.

    He is also known as one of hockey's foremost images of the 'mullet' hairstyle.

    Melrose is cousins with former NHL players Wendel Clark and Joe Kocur.

    In the video game Mutant League Hockey, Melrose is portrayed as Coach Smellnose.

    [edit] See also

    [edit] External link

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