Welcome back to The Hockey News – Vancouver Canucks site’s Coaches as Players series. Last time, we looked at newly-appointed Canucks head coach Adam Foote’s long-tenured NHL career with the Québec Nordiques/Colorado Avalanche and Columbus Blue Jackets. Today, we’ll turn to one of Foote’s new assistant coaches, Kevin Dean.
Dean, a defenceman, played in two seasons with Culver Military Academy Prep before being drafted into the NHL 86th overall by the New Jersey Devils in 1987. He then moved onto the University of New Hampshire in the NCAA, playing there for four seasons before joining the Devils organization. In his time with New Hampshire, Dean scored 14 goals and 36 assists in 131 games. This included a 10-goal, 12-assist season in 31 games back in 1990–91.
For the next four seasons, Dean split his playing time with the Utica Devils and Albany River Rats of the AHL and the Cinncinati Cyclones of the ECHL and later IHL. His time with the River Rats was most notable of these, as he had a career-high in goals in an AHL season with nine in 1993–94, as well as 33 assists in 70 games. He was also named the team’s captain the season after and helped them win the 1995 Calder Cup.
Dean made his NHL debut in the 1994–95 season, skating for the Devils on February 27, 1995 against the Montréal Canadiens. He played in 17 games for New Jersey in this season, grabbing his first NHL point in his sixth game — an assist against the Ottawa Senators. As well as winning the 1995 Calder Cup, he also dressed in three of the Devils’ playoff games, adding two assists and winning his first career Stanley Cup with the big club. He is part of a small group of players who have won both the Calder Cup and Stanley Cup in the same season.
In the seasons after winning both the Stanley Cup and Calder Cup, Dean spent the bulk of his time with New Jersey. From the 1995–96 season to 1998–99, he played in 181 games with the Devils, scoring three goals and 28 assists in this span of time. He also represented Team USA at the 1997–98 IIHF World Championship, skating in three of the team’s games.
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The 1999–2000 season saw Dean move on from the Devils organization, which he’d been with since being drafted nearly 13 years prior. In this particular year, Dean skated with three different NHL teams — the Atlanta Thrashers, Dallas Stars, and Chicago Blackhawks. He played in 23 games with the Thrashers, scoring one goal in a November 3 matchup against the Tampa Bay Lightning. On December 15, he was traded to the Stars in exchange for future considerations (later a ninth-round pick that was converted into Mark McRae). He spent 14 games with Dallas before his next move on February 8, in which himself, Derek Plante, and a 2001 second-round pick were flipped to Chicago for Sylvain Cote and Dave Manson.
Chicago was the team that Dean rounded out his NHL career with, as he played the remainder of the 1999–2000 season with them, scoring two goals and eight assists in his final 27 games of the season. After this, he spent one more year with the Blackhawks, posting 11 assists in 69 games in 2000–01. In 2001–02, Dean made his return to the AHL, playing in 76 games for the Milwaukee Admirals and tallying five goals and 14 assists. Less than five years later, Dean began his coaching career as an assistant coach with the Lowell Devils.
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