Dan Bylsma

Daniel Brian Bylsma (born September 19, 1970) is an American professional ice hockey coach and former player.

He is the head coach of the Coachella Valley Firebirds of the American Hockey League (AHL).

He was previously head coach of the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Buffalo Sabres in the National Hockey League (NHL), and was also an assistant coach for the Detroit Red Wings.

He also was the former head coach of the United States men's national ice hockey team.

He also played baseball and was the starting left fielder as a freshman on Christian's 1985 State championship team.

In his senior year, he was a member of the all-state all-class "Dream Team" (the best player at each position in the state – all classes), and won many regional baseball honors.

Bylsma played amateur hockey in Muskegon Junior Hockey, Norton Shores Recreational Leagues, and Grand Rapids GRAHA before playing Junior "B" hockey in Canada for the St. Marys Lincolns and the Oakville Blades of the Ontario Hockey Association.

Bylsma went on to play college hockey at Bowling Green State University from 1988–1992 and was drafted by the Winnipeg Jets in his freshman year.

He was twice selected to the Central Collegiate Hockey Association All Academic Team and once earned Honorable Mention.

He was a Bowling Green Scholar Athlete all four years and won the Jack Gregory Award for the highest grade point average on the team in his Sophomore season and the Howard Brown Coaches' Award for excellence in his senior year.

Bylsma is one of the few players in the CCHA to have scored a shorthanded goal while his team was two men short.

He was drafted in the sixth round (109th overall) of the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, by the Winnipeg Jets.

During his high school days, Bylsma was a standout in many sports, including golf, baseball, and ice hockey.

Bylsma graduated from Western Michigan Christian High School where he won the Class D golf individual championship as a freshman.

Despite being drafted by the Winnipeg Jets, Bylsma never played a game for them, and was signed by the Los Angeles Kings in the summer of 1994.

During the 1994–95 labor stoppage, Bylsma earned the nickname "Disco Dan".

The nickname was adopted by teammates while playing for a minor league team in Phoenix.

Veteran goaltender Byron Dafoe already went by Bylsma's former moniker of "Bysie" so the name "Disco Dan" was given due to Bylsma's penchant for dancing in the locker room.

He played parts of five seasons for the Kings, acting as a defensive forward.

In his first season, when he played only four games for the Kings, he was captain of their International Hockey League (IHL) affiliate, the Phoenix Roadrunners.

Bylsma played 95 American Hockey League (AHL) games with the Cincinnati Mighty Ducks, the Lowell Lock Monsters, the Springfield Falcons, the Albany River Rats, the Moncton Hawks and the Rochester Americans, and reached the Calder Cup Finals in 1994.

He also played for the Long Beach Ice Dogs, who were the Kings' IHL affiliate after the Roadrunners folded in 1997.

Signed as a free agent by the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in the summer of 2000, Bylsma was a steadying influence on a rebuilding Anaheim team, and was made an alternate captain.

In his second season, he set a career high in points (17).

Bylsma struggled his entire career to stay in the NHL, mostly due to a lack of natural offensive ability (his primary role in the NHL had always been penalty killing).

He retired from playing following the 2003–04 season.

Injuries took a toll in later years, and before being put on waivers in January 2004, Bylsma missed 31 games due to knee surgery.

Bylsma served as an assistant coach with the AHL's Cincinnati Mighty Ducks (2004–05) and the NHL's New York Islanders (2005–06).

During the 2008–09 season, Bylsma coached the Penguins' AHL affiliate Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins.

Prior to coaching the Sabres, Bylsma was the head coach for the Pittsburgh Penguins, whom he led to a Stanley Cup championship in 2009, just four months after being promoted to Pittsburgh's head coaching position.

Prior to coaching the Penguins, he played as a forward in the NHL with the Los Angeles Kings and Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, and coached in the American Hockey League (AHL).

On February 15, 2009, with the Pittsburgh Penguins struggling to make the playoffs, the Penguins organization announced that it had relieved head coach Michel Therrien of his duties and had promoted Bylsma to serve as interim head coach of the team.

At 38, he was the youngest head coach in the NHL at the time.

Through his first 25 games as Penguins' coach, his 18–3–4 record amounted to 40 points—the second most of any coach in NHL history through their first 25 games.

On April 28, Penguins General Manager Ray Shero announced that Bylsma had been named permanent head coach of the team.

On June 12, 2009, Bylsma led the Pittsburgh Penguins to a Stanley Cup championship, becoming the 14th coach and the second mid-season replacement to win the Stanley Cup in their first season.

While the win made him just the fifth ever American-born coach to win the cup, he also became the third American in the last five seasons to do so.

Bylsma was awarded the Jack Adams Award as the league's most outstanding coach for the 2010–2011 season due to the Penguins still being a contender for the Stanley Cup without his two star players Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin.

On April 22, 2013, Bylsma became the fastest NHL coach ever to reach 200 wins with a 3-1 win over the Ottawa Senators.

On June 30 of the same year, Bylsma was appointed head coach of the United States Olympic Hockey Team for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.