Scoolu Coaches and Hockey Hall-of-Famers Grant Fuhr and Bryan Trottier headline group of coaches for new 3 on 3 league 3ICE
3ICE is a new 3 on 3 professional hockey league in North America. The league will be similar to the 3 on 3 format of the NHL’s overtime system. CEO E.J. Johnston’s vision is to take what he felt was the best and most exciting part of hockey and make it their full format. 3ICE was created to bring the fans one thing, pure unadulterated excitement.
Of the eight coaches brought on by 3ICE, two are also Scoolu instructors – NHL legends Grant Fuhr and Bryan Trottier.
Scoolu’s Grant Fuhr has won 5 Stanley Cup championships and was a 6X All Star over his 19-year career in the NHL. Fuhr was inducted into the Hockey Hall-of-Fame and was named one of the top 100 Greatest NHL players in history. Fuhr won the Vezina Trophy and the William Jennings Trophy. He is best remembered for a decade of stellar play for the Edmonton Oilers in the 1980’s. Fuhr is also a former goaltending coach for the Phoenix Coyotes and Calgary Flames. Since his retirement, Fuhr has spent his time as an elite goaltending coach as well as working with amateur and professional players.
Fuhr explained that “overtime (the three-on-three format) is the most exciting part of hockey, other than the playoffs, so we are taking the most exciting part of hockey and putting it on display.” Fuhr believes the league should be a lot of stick handling, puck control, speed and up tempo, a system he knows very well.
Scoolu’s Bryan Trottier is a Hockey Hall of Famer, 7X Stanley Cup champion and an 8X All-Star. He won four Stanley Cups with the Islanders, two with the Penguins and one as an assistant coach with the Colorado Avalanche. Trottier has won the Calder Memorial Trophy, Art Ross, Hart Memorial and Conn Smythe Trophy. In 2017, Trottier was named one of the 100 Greatest NHL Players in history. Trottier also had a short stint as head coach of the New York Rangers and was also a former assistant coach of the Colorado Avalanche and Buffalo Sabres. In recent years, Trottier has been coaching through Scoolu with up and coming players using the skills and experiences he’s learned from his extensive career to help mentor them.
This new league will be a great opportunity for Trottier to get behind the bench again. “I really enjoy being part of something that’s innovative and, at the same time, work with young players. We’re high-energy coaches,” said Trottier to Newsday. “Overtime, all the time,” is the moto being used by the start-up league. "In today’s wham-bam attention span world, I think the quickness, the idea of multiple games, the idea of short periods, action action, boom boom, it’s gonna grab a lot of eyeballs,” explained Trottier to USA Today.
The new 3ICE league will be a great opportunity for NHL players at the end of their career or young highly skilled AHL players to showcase their skills and play under the direction of hockey's greatest legends. Fuhr and Trottier bring a lot to the table and will be terrific assets as head coaches in the new 3ICE league that is set to take place during the summer of 2021.