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Wiser John Tortorella ready to coach Team USA at World Cup of Hockey

John Tortorella

John Tortorella

(Darryl Dyck / AP)
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A newly humble-sounding John Tortorella expressed his gratitude Tuesday at being appointed coach of Team USA for next year’s World Cup of Hockey, saying he had learned a lot about himself and has learned from his mistakes since he lost his last NHL coaching job in Vancouver after the 2013-14 season.

Tortorella, who repeated that he deserved to be fired by the Canucks after only one season behind their bench, added that he hasn’t discarded his entire coaching philosophy but has tempered it. He likely will have to adjust again to fit the intense atmosphere and urgency of a brief international tournament. The World Cup, which will feature eight teams, will take place next Sept. 17-Oct. 1 in Toronto.

“As I’ve gone through my career I think I’ve made some pretty key mistakes early on in trying to do too much with these guys,” he said during a conference call. “These guys are thoroughbreds. I go back to the mind-set, I think it’s the most important thing in this tournament, and that’s for us to believe, as the U.S. squad, that we are going to win. It’s not about seeing how it’s going to be played. We’re going to play our style….

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“This is a short tournament. We are going to know who we are and we’re going to play our game.”

That game, he said, will be assertive. “It’s about pressure. It’s about attacking and let’s forget about the Xs and O’s,” said Tortorella, a Massachusetts native who coached Tampa Bay to the Stanley Cup in 1994 and coached the New York Rangers for five seasons in addition to serving as an assistant coach of the 2010 U.S. men’s Olympic team. “It’s about a mind-set. It’s about a team that needs to feel good about itself before this tournament even starts, needs to feel strong mentally about itself. I think intangibles in such a short term are huge.

“It’s going to be a very simple brand but it’s going to be pressure.”

Dean Lombardi, general manager of Team USA and the Kings, said he knew of the hard-driving Tortorella’s passion for coaching well before he interviewed him for the World Cup job. That played as big a part in the decision as Tortorella’s 446 NHL coaching victories, the most recorded by an American coach.

“There’s no phony here,” Lombardi said, “and sometimes, yes, it gets the best of him but there’s also no question in my mind that he is all about those American values. This tournament is about nationalism and there’s no question he’s an American through and through.”

Being back in the spotlight and behind the bench surely won’t hurt Tortorella’s chances of getting another NHL job, though he said that wasn’t his motivation in accepting this role.

“It’s two separate things,” he said. “When Dean called me and he talked about this I immediately thought, ‘This is the USA. This is your country.’ I think it took me two seconds.

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“I am so excited just to be part of a staff and then to meet up with the players next year, the best players, and try and do this the right way. I’m already knee deep into what I think we’ll touch upon in those 10, 11 days. I’m focused on the World Cup and that’s all I’m worried about now.”

helene.elliott@latimes.com

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