HERB BROOKS : He Goes St. Elsewhere in an Attempt to Perform Another Miracle on Ice

Just when he thought his well of hockey challenges had run dry, Herb Brooks lowered his bucket into a pool of possibilities called St. Cloud State.

“These kids needed direction and I wanted to get back into coaching; it was a perfect match,” Brooks said. “These kids want to learn. They’re hungry for it and they’ve got great attitudes. We don’t have all the talent in the world, so if we don’t have kids with good attitudes, then school’s out.”

Most observers thought Brooks’ lights were out when he took the job at St. Cloud State, a 13,000-enrollment university that plays NCAA Division III hockey in a 2,000-seat arena.

After all, wasn’t this man too big for such a small-time job?

Wasn’t Herb Brooks a member of the U.S. Olympic hockey teams in 1964 and 1968? Didn’t he win three national championships in seven years at the University of Minnesota and then walk away from perhaps the most prestigious college hockey coaching job? Didn’t he win 100 games faster than any coach in New York Rangers history before he left because of internal squabbles in the organization?

But, mostly, wasn’t Herb Brooks the King Midas who touched the 1980 U.S. hockey team and turned it into Olympic gold?

Yes, yes, yes and yes. The same Herb Brooks.

And now the man who worked the Miracle on Ice in 1980 is patching torn pants, painting peeled lockers and meeting with the St. Cloud Rotary Club.

After residents of this 42,000-person community located about 65 miles northwest of Minneapolis finally realized it really was THAT Herb Brooks, their obvious reaction was: “Why?”

“My situation is a philosophical one,” Brooks said from his modest office at the St. Cloud Municipal Sports Center. “I believe in the philosophy that Minnesota needs more than two colleges with Division I hockey. Minnesota and UMD (Minnesota-Duluth) are great hockey schools. St. Cloud can be, too.”

Brooks took the St. Cloud job May 28, shortly after turning down an offer from the NHL’s Winnipeg Jets that he said would have paid him at least 10 times the reported $20,000 salary he makes as coach of the Huskies. He also rejected an offer from the Minnesota North Stars before the 1985-86 NHL season.

“I don’t want to sound like Jack Armstrong the All-American Boy, but I’m not here for the money,” he said. “I have a bigger mission.”

That mission is to bring Division I hockey to St. Cloud, a move that Brooks hopes will lead other schools in the state to make the jump from Division III.

The first step, laying a foundation, begins Friday night when the Huskies host Gustavus Adolphus.

By next year, Brooks wants to play an independent schedule featuring a number of Division I opponents. And his master plan calls for the Huskies to play in a state-funded 6,000-seat arena and be accepted into the prestigious Western Collegiate Hockey Association by the 1989-90 season.

Brooks, 48, was evasive when asked how long he thought he’d stay at St. Cloud State before that well, too, went dry.

“The first year is the most difficult year,” he said. “The second year should be a turn-key situation; just turn the key and it runs itself. If I’m driving home on (Interstate) 94 and wrap my car around a tree, all the resources will still be here even if Herb Brooks isn’t. The understanding I have here is that I can take it year by year.”

Because he didn’t commit until after the 1985-86 school year, Brooks received only a one-year appointment. The job must be posted after the year, at which time Brooks could sign a four-year contract, athletic director Morris Kurtz said.

But even for one year -- even for one day -- Kurtz is thrilled to have Brooks on campus.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that we needed additional exposure,” Kurtz said. “We asked Herb to serve as a consultant and he got caught up in the excitement of building a program practically from ground zero. It might have been luck and it might have been circumstances, but we ended up with the finest coach and teacher of hockey in the country.”

Underline the word teacher. Brooks runs a hockey clinic, not a hockey practice. The rink is his classroom.

“He’s like a professor of the game,” senior co-captain and leading scorer Mike Brodzinski said. “I’ll probably learn more in the first half of this season than I have in my whole life.”

Brooks’ assistant coach, Craig Dahl, runs most of the practices. Dahl also handles most of the administrative work while Brooks runs around town drumming up support for the Huskies.

But when Brooks skated onto the ice at a recent practice, there was no doubt as to who was in charge.

He spoke quietly, but with authority; slowly, but with a sense of urgency:

“You people are too used to just showing up and playing. We’ll be playing Minnesota and UMD in the next couple of years and I’ll tell you one thing -- you can’t play that way and survive.

“Watch a game on TV. The team that flows and that has rhythm is the winner.

“Patience. Poise. Mental discipline. Mental discipline. Mental discipline.

“Weak side. Weak side. Weak side. Weak side. If you don’t have the puck, get out of there and cover the weak side. Anytime you’re on the weak side, just say, ‘My partner is going to screw up and I have to cover his rear.’ Weak side. Weak side. Weak side.

“We’re going to be redundant. We’ll go over things and go over things and go over things and go over things until they become automatic.

“I’ve done these things before. They won a gold medal.”