Brandon Naurato Named Permanent Head Coach Of Michigan Hockey
We didn't post the Hunter Dickinson news because it's not 100% clear if it's an official exit yet and also we want to still be happy about Jadyn Davis. That rule thus applies to the next piece of news on this jampacked Friday afternoon, equally happy:
Brandon Naurato Announced as Head Coach of Michigan Hockey
— Michigan Hockey (@umichhockey) March 31, 2023
Read >> https://t.co/PKpiDtjJTv#GoBlue〽️ pic.twitter.com/OI6D93r14o
In what seemed like a foregone conclusion, Michigan Athletics has decided to take the interim tag off of Brandon Naurato and make him the permanent head hockey coach. Naurato, now 38 years old, ascended to the job of interim head coach in August, after Mel Pearson was let go following an independent investigation into his conduct and the team culture of the Michigan Hockey program. Naurato had been on staff for one season under Pearson, before that being a private hockey skills consultant, consultant for the Detroit Red Wings, and hockey analyst/blogger. Naurato's playing days concluded in 2012 after four seasons in the ECHL, IHL, and Central Hockey League, following his four year career at Michigan, where he played under Red Berenson from 2005-09.
After being thrust into the position rather late in the summer, Naurato spent the weeks he had re-shaping the program, hiring a new assistant coach (Rob Rassey), head of hockey ops (Topher Scott), and a new analytics department headed by Anthony Ciatti. With his guys now in place on the management side, Naurato made sure to keep the roster and incoming recruits together, a group that would be loaded with talent. The team started the season 7-1 but then ran into adversity as B1G play started, due to an outbreak of a respiratory virus that ravaged the locker room and nearly killed defenseman Steve Holtz.
Since losing the first game of the second half in disastrous fashion to Ohio State, Michigan has gone 14-3-2 in their past 19 games, winning the B1G Tournament for the second straight season and repeating as Frozen Four participants. The team looked choppy at points this season but in the back half, they have been playing excellent, composed hockey, appearing like the coach's systems were resonating with the players. In the aftermath of winning the Midwest Regional in Allentown, PA, last weekend, the administration did the only logical thing in handing Naurato the keys full-time.
In less than one full season, Naurato has placed his fingerprints all over the program, not just in the hires he made in the off-season but also on the recruiting trail and his approach to player management. Tasked with cleaning up the cultural issues that pervaded under Pearson outlined in the report, Naurato has seemingly done an admirable job, a reported player's coach who is well-liked by his team. He has embraced innovative and progressive coaching tactics, including prioritizing the mental health of his players, and at this point, it's hard to argue with the results.
There are now six days until Michigan Hockey takes the ice in Tampa for the Frozen Four, in search of their tenth national title, but when they do so, they will now have a much more stable coaching situation behind the bench. There is no content after the jump.
Good news for a Friday. On another note, How does our recruiting class look for next year?
I haven't looked into it too deeply yet, will do that more once the FF is over but it's an alright class. Not the same standard as the last three because there was a bit of a recruiting gap when the coaching change happened, but they have a fresh slate of goalies and a skilled F I really like in Nick Moldenhauer out of the Chicago Steel
Thanks Alex, I really appreciate the hockey coverage we have here-there is literally nowhere else to get this content.
Let's hope we bring home a trophy in Tampa. Then we can focus on fixing the regional format for hockey.
Good news, has anyone told Warde yet?
i laughed.
Bravo
He's dreamy.
Pretty insane that the head coaches of the 3 major sports are all Michigan alums
At the place that coined the term "Michigan Man"? It's always a surprise when a coach does not have ties to the program.
Yeah, but these coaches feel different, Howard and Harbaugh especially. They had national profiles who happened to be Michigan Men, rather than being hired just because they happened to play here. Even Narauto had some stature outside the program, and didn't simply slide into the role because he played here.
Which is the ideal. Harbaugh wouldn’t have walked away from the pros for just any job. We were in the running because he played here. We want the best coach possible and if a guy’s connections here make him interested, so much the better.
Correct on Howard and particularly Harbaugh.
Naurato has some stature outside the program but he was in position to get the job because he's a Michigan guy; the outside stature gave him juuuust enough credence to even be considered for that.
I think there's a real chance he's a gold strike, but if that is the case it's not something you can just assume from his profile.
March 31st, 2023 at 10:51 PM ^
It doesn’t seem like Naurato followed any kind of standard career path for coaches at this level. He didn’t come up through the Minnesota States or UMass-Lowell’s of the college hockey world. Or had a long career as right hand man to successful head coach. I think he got the interim gig because he was here, he was not a Mel Pearson guy and Warde dithered on Mel and was stuck needing someone late. Says a lot about Naurato that he seized the opportunity.
March 31st, 2023 at 11:27 PM ^
Yeah. It wasn’t expected. He wasn’t even the logical candidate from the outside—that was Muckalt. Muckalt, by the way, deserves a lot of credit for sticking it out after getting passed over. Whether he had much of a choice or not, that takes character.
Honestly, I thought (and maybe Michigan did too) that Naurato was a good candidate to be the interim coach in part because it wouldn’t be a bad look to part ways with him after the year. Nobody expected much, and he hadn’t “paid his dues,” and further the difficult situation wouldn’t be held against him so it wouldn’t be bad for his career later on.
But he wound up messing with all that by producing a very good team that won the B1G tournament on the road against an elite Minnesota team and carved its way to the Frozen Four.
Not sure if considered major sport or not but Bonnie Tholl is the softball coach and she is a UM alum as well.
At Michigan, softball is a major sport.
Fun fact: this is the third time that all 3 "major sport" coaches are Michigan alums.
1948 to 1952
Vic Heyliger (hockey)
Ernest McCoy (basketball)
Bennie Oosterbaan (football)
1960 to 1968
Al Renfrew (hockey)
Dave Strack (basketball)
Bump Elliott (football)
What a great Friday so far! Very well deserved and I’m really looking forward to how he develops as a coach.
A well-deserved reward for a good first season that hopefully ends with a title.
The superstitious part of me almost felt they should have waited until the end of the year but it's clear he's been coaching under the assumption of a permanent post for a while.
The team deserved to know. We want to keep as many 1st & 2nd year players as possible.
Excellent decision. Maybe it wont pan out but given what youve seen this season you gotta give him a shot
Domo arigato, Head Coach Naurato.
Such good news! Bravo!
Weird sports news day for UM.
Davis Good
Dickenson Bad
Naurato Good
I really like removing any doubts about the coaching situation prior to the Frozen Four. We already know the team is highly competitive with both Minnesota and BU, so I like removing any unnecessary pressure to play for the coach and instead just let them focus on the task at hand.
I love JUB, but his disagreement hasn’t swayed me at all. This is the right move. Congrats coach!
Absolutely the right call. The obvious call, really; he has already matched the best season that Mel put together.
Granted, it's with Mel's roster. There are still questions to be answered long-term, as there are for any new coaching hires. He has demonstrated a *lot* in the last 8 months. Certainly earned the chance to do this long-term.
March 31st, 2023 at 10:28 PM ^
It's Mel's roster sure, but he did enough to earn the title. I was skeptical when he was named interim but he did more than enough to deserve this.
Probably should have told him "if you win the whole thing, the job is definitely yours"
PEOPLE NEED MOTIVATION
We've found Dave Brandon's burner account.
Congratulations to both Coach Naurato and to Michigan for sealing the deal now.
It's crazy to think of the long-term possibilities of an upstart alum getting the gig when he's 38. In comparison, Red got the gig when he was 45 and stuck around until he was in his late 70s. We could be in for a very, very long and stable tenure here if he plays his cards right.
Well deserved! Congratulations, Brandon. I'm sure you know that a national championship is the expectation for your first year.😉
Bout fuckin' time.
Honestly, been a little skeptical of the coaching for a good portion of the year. On paper we seemed to be having an excellent year considering the absurd amount of adversity we faced, but yet at the same time, watching the team on the ice I couldn't help but shake that the team's biggest problems seemed to be what ought to be some of the most coachable corrections.
But there is no denying that we did do well for all the circumstances to weather and there is definitely no denying that whatever he's been preaching, the team has started practicing because they have been dynamite since the B1G semifinals.
Ultimately making him the permanent coach was always going to be the right move when it was clear the team was not cratering, but now I don't think there is any doubt he is more than just the best available, he is THE right choice outright. Excited to see this ride to it's conclusion this season and looking forward to what he can do with more time and a return to a more average level of team adversity.
Prioritizing mental health is good and everything, but not also promoting mental toughness to go along with mental health, it just falls apart under adverse circumstances. Sometimes you won't have anyone around to walk you through things and that's where mental toughness comes in. As the focus on mental health has increased, so has the increase in suicide rates. I believe there is a correlation with focusing on mental health at the cost of mental toughness instead of in conjunction with mental toughness.
I'm sorry to bring this up here, but this is a very important topic to me and the focus on mental health hasn't decreased suicides, suicides increased instead. Whenever I see "prioritizing mental health" come up, it's almost always at the cost of mental toughness and that concerns me just as much.
On what basis do you imply that this hockey organization is not “promoting mental toughness”?
The problem with “old school” coaches is that they rarely actually did anything to proactively promote mental toughness - they just screamed and yelled and shamed people for exhibiting anything that looked like “mental weakness”. You can’t work at and improve your weaknesses in a place where it’s not safe to even admit they exist, you can just try to suppress them and hope you don’t collapse from the strain
In this context, “prioritizing mental health” means recognizing that people perform best when they are mentally healthy, and taking positive steps to support that.
I was suicidal once. In my personal experience, focusing on mental health did nothing to help my situation. It helped the pockets of those focusing on my mental health, but it did nothing to help me. Luckily, I had mental toughness from a younger age, ie, military family, football, wrestling teaching me to rely on myself and to be strong through the tough times. It wasn't easy, but once I stopped with the counseling and relied on myself getting better, things got better and after a year, no issues. So, yes this is a personal topic to me. It has been my experience that when the focus is mental health, it's at the cost of mental toughness instead of in tandem with it. Couple that with suicides have gone up the more we've focused on mental health, then maybe I might be on to something. The fact that people want to neg me because I won't toe the mental health line shows how short-sighted people are on here. I indicated they are both important and should be nurtured together.
And to answer your question clearly; in every instance I've seen personally, prioritizing mental health has come at the cost of developing mental toughness.
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