Calgary Flames name Lambert, Savard assistant coaches to Ryan Huska

CALGARY -

The Calgary Flames have hired Dan Lambert and Marc Savard to be assistants to new head coach Ryan Huska.

Lambert spent the last four seasons as an assistant coach with the Nashville Predators.

Savard, who played 221 of his 800 career NHL games with the Flames from 1999 to 2003, spent the last two seasons coaching the Ontario Hockey League's Windsor Spitfires.

“I know how competitive Marc is from when we played together over three seasons here in Calgary,” new Flames general manager Craig Conroy said Friday in a statement.

“Savy has a great offensive mind which will help boost our power play and help drive our offensive game.”

Lambert was Huska's assistant with the Western Hockey League's Kelowna Rockets for three seasons.

Lambert became head coach of the Rockets in 2015 when the club won a WHL title.

“Dan served as Ryan Huska's assistant in Kelowna from 2009 to 2014,” Conroy said. “We feel those past relationships will allow us to get up to speed quicker and hit the ground running.

“While Dan will be running our defence, he also provides well-balanced experience having run the power play in Nashville the past four years. The focus is keeping the puck out of the net, but Dan's approach generates an offensive flair from the back end.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 23, 2023.