Blue Jackets love from Up North

Gotta love this little profile of the Ken Hitchcock and the Columbus Blue Jackets from the (Toronto) Globe and Mail:

You hear it all around the NHL these days, mostly wherever there is a team off to a slow start, with a new coach trying to sell players on a system of play. 

All the hopeful words you hear - from coaches such as the Calgary Flames’ Brent Sutter or the Toronto Maple Leafs’ Ron Wilson or the Boston Bruins’ Claude Julien - centre on how difficult is to get the message through to their players and then have it be digested and implemented on a consistent night-in, night-out basis.

They talk about systems; they ask for structure, but what they really need to do is to illustrate what a player buy-in looks like is to show a little video of the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Hitch then goes on to explain how the CBJ have implemented the Hitchcock system.  It apparently has been a slow process, one player at a time.  And now it's finally paying off!