Dale Hunter has won gold at the World Junior Championship before, and that's just a small part of his coaching accomplishments. Those who've worked with him over the years explain why he's the best.
When Team Canada steps on the ice at the world juniors this year, the players do so knowing they have, quite possibly, the best junior hockey coach in the history of the game behind the bench.
Dale Hunter has been an elite bench boss for the OHL's London Knights for more than 20 years, during which time he won five league championships (the Knights won a sixth when he left midway through the 2011-12 campaign to coach the NHL's Washington Capitals) and three Memorial Cups.
He is one of only two CHL coaches to win more than 1,000 games, and should Hunter carry on with the Knights for another four or five seasons, he will likely pass the iconic Brian Kilrea's record of 1,194 victories.
So what makes Hunter the best? Just ask those who have worked with him over the years.
"The reason he's the best is that he understands how to coach each individual person," said San Jose Sharks defenseman Sam Dickinson. "He gives you exactly what you need to succeed. He's seen it first-hand with the career he had playing and coaching in the NHL. He's one of the best coaches in junior hockey – the best coach in junior hockey – and the commitment and determination he puts in himself, he wants to win just as much as the players do, and that culture shows you what it means to be a London Knight as soon as you show up there."
Dickinson, a rookie with the Sharks this season, not only helped the Knights to a Memorial Cup title last season, but in debuting with San Jose, he added to an incredible legacy.
Since Dale replaced Lindsay Hofford as coach in London midway through the 2001-02 season, the Knights have graduated at least one player into the NHL from every single draft class except two: the 2025 draft, where the players are too young to be expected to be in the league yet, and 2010 (Jared Knight and Reid McNeill were drafted but never played in the NHL).
And that success is shared. You really can't talk about Dale Hunter without highlighting the equally incredible work done by his brother Mark Hunter, the longtime GM of the Knights, who's on Canada's world junior management group this year.
"They're the gold standard in London, both Dale and Mark," said Jeff Jackson, the former agent and current Edmonton Oilers CEO and director of hockey operations. "They're both amazing. Dale just has a way of easing good players into his lineup at the right pace. Not everybody is happy about it when they first get to London because even the first-round picks aren't handed a lot of ice time. They go through sort of an apprenticeship, almost.
"As an agent, I had a great relationship with Dale and Mark that goes way back to when we were teenagers, and Dale would always laugh and say, 'Don't worry about it. Next year he'll be playing this much, and the year after, he'll be leading our power play.' It's hard for a young kid who has high expectations, and Dale does a really good job managing that aspect of it, because sometimes it can crack a kid."
That formula of letting players slow-cook – oftentimes on a local Jr. B team before the actual London lineup – has worked time and time again. So even if it's tough for an elite young talent to swallow, it's easy to look at the players that came before who are now thriving in the NHL.
"Sam Dickinson didn't play a ton his first year, then became a dominant player," Jackson said. "Evan Bouchard, Connor McMichael, Luke Evangelista were all clients of ours who had a slow start, but it was on purpose. Dale's really good at bringing these guys along, and at the right time, it's 'OK, you're going to get your opportunity, and you're ready for it.' That's the key.
"A lot of kids get a lot of ice time early on, and the expectations are high, and they fail, and then they have nowhere to go because they've lost their confidence. In London, both Mark and Dale expect a lot but they also create a situation of excellence where, when you're ready to thrive, you're ready to thrive."
The typical junior hockey cycle involves teams bottoming out, getting a phenom or two in the draft, then building up for a championship window of one, maybe two years, then starting that four-to-five season cycle again. London doesn't do that – the Knights are pretty much always good because their development and drafting are so sharp. And having elite kids from each age group helps propagate that success.
"It starts with the culture he has created there," said St. Louis Blues star Robert Thomas. "Every guy that comes in looks up to the older players, and a lot of them are drafted and have a great work ethic. It's been turning over for years and years. When I came in, I had Mitch Marner, Matthew Tkachuk and Christian Dvorak, so many guys that I looked at and thought, 'OK, this is what I need to do to get to that level.' Then I tried to pass it on when I became an older junior."
Tkachuk was also an example of London's ability to recruit: he was an American kid originally committed to NCAA Notre Dame before joining the Knights. Before him, London had the biggest U.S. recruit of all-time in future Hall of Famer Patrick Kane, who loved playing for Hunter.
"He was great, him and Mark really helped me and Sam Gagner prepare to become NHLers," Kane said. "We were rookies, and we were draft-eligible, so we were adjusting to playing that better competition in the OHL. We both played world juniors and then had playoffs, so it was a long season.
"They really managed us well and taught us how to play like NHLers. You look back at that year, I came in ranked as maybe a third-rounder for the draft, and by Christmas I was projected to go first overall. They can really help improve your game and your draft stock. That was one of the reasons I wanted to go there, to prove myself and become a hockey player."
The fact Hunter has been able to teach players from several distinct generations and still get results today is also notable. We've seen a number of old-school bench bosses who just can't get the job done anymore because their tactics no longer work. That's not the case in London.
"He understands where to push and how to push," said Mark Hunter. "There's no in-your-face, out-of-control coaching. He's under control. And I believe his bench is underrated – he puts guys in situations to be successful. Lastly, he's demanding on structure and making sure players play the right way."
Hunter has coached Canada's world junior team once in the past, and wouldn't you know it? That team won gold back in 2020. He also coached the Hlinka Gretzky team in 2014 and won that tournament, too. So it's not just a London thing; Hunter gets results internationally.
That's great news for this year's world junior squad, as expectations will once again be sky-high for a Canadian program that has lost twice in a row in the quarterfinal. Coaching was not a strength in either of those failures, so Hunter should be a welcome presence this time around.
And while he has nothing to prove at this point in his career, there's a reason he's still going.
"It's development, and it's about the kids," Hunter said. "I've coached in the NHL, and they're already seasoned – they know what they have there. But in junior, they're 16, 17 years old, they're young. It's the teenaged years which are important in hockey and life, too. We're all parents, and it's like raising your kids all over again. It keeps you young. You're dealing with teenagers, and it's fun."
It's an attitude that his players know well.
"You could tell pretty quickly how much he loves being in that spot," Thomas said. "He loves turning young boys into adults, loves watching them develop. You can tell he cares for his players so much and that really gives him an edge over a lot of other people. He's so genuine, whether it's talking about skills, watching video, talking about how hard you need to work. A lot of players can credit a lot of their success to how he handled them in junior."
And that influence could mean another gold medal for Canada at the world juniors. It has certainly led to an incredible amount of success in London for Hunter and his brother Mark.
"He's won 1,000 games as a coach and they just won the Memorial Cup again," Kane said. "It seems like they're always in it, always getting better and you wonder how they do it. The operation there is incredible. It never ceases to amaze me that they're still doing it."
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