Long Island Press Release

[IslandersGM]

Islanders hire Vet GM Kuchmak to Return the
Team to Greatness

Sept 9, 2013 Nassau, NY

President of Hockey Operations Garth Snow announced today that he had finally found a GM to fill their vacant GM role.

Last filled by Jonathan Berube, new hire Chris Kuchmak comes in as the former GM of the Edmonton Oilers. He stepped aside to fulfill other obligations this past February and was replaced by Mike Cleary.

"Chris bring a lot of experience to the table. He spent 3 1/2 years with the Oilers and enabled their rebuilding process. A process that we are currently a part of as well." Snow stated. "Chris rebuilt his whole system through the draft. There were not many trades and the Barons won the Calder this past year. We are aiming for that same outcome. I think Islander fans will be very pleased with this decision."

Talking about the status of his team,
"Let me be clear," said Snow, "we're not where they should be right now and that is unacceptable. And we need to get better immediately. That starts today.

New GM Kuchmak then spoke to that very topic.

"I'm an impatient guy and I bring that impatience to this situation, we have to do some bold things and expose ourselves to some semblance of risk to move the team forward in a rapid fashion. The future is extremely bright, but we've got to add depth to help these young players and help our team grow. We've got to add competitiveness. We lack a true understanding of how difficult it is to have success at this level, and It's a difficult league to win in.

"Every morning when the alarm rings at my house, I understand there are 29 other teams trying to beat my brains in. We have to arm our coaches and our core players in that dressing room with the personnel that's going to go forward and compete to the level that we know they're going to get to.

"Not only to be highly competitive, but to be challenging for the Stanley Cup."