Patrick Williams, TheAHL.com Features Writer
Geordie Kinnear played a hard-nosed, team-first, no-glamour type of game as a defenseman with the Albany River Rats during the rough-and-tough 1990’s era of hockey.
So it’s only fitting that Kinnear coaches the same selfless, low-key way that he played.
And now, like then, his work is earning rewards.
With his Charlotte Checkers holding the top point percentage in the Atlantic Division as of New Year’s Eve, he will be off to the 2025 AHL All-Star Classic presented by Spotlight 29 Casino on February 2-3 in Palm Desert, Calif. It is his first All-Star selection as a coach.
Kinnear went to the AHL All-Star Classic as a player in 1996 and 1998 and was selected but injured two other times during his eight pro seasons.
Now 51, Kinnear came into the AHL as a 20-year-old New Jersey Devils prospect in 1993, a seventh-round pick who had to battle for every minute of ice time in the organization’s ultra-competitive and burgeoning development system. He won the Calder Cup with River Rats in his second season and went on to earn the Albany captaincy.
But as Albany produced one future NHL’er after another, having any chance to crack the roster of a Stanley Cup-winning NHL team became increasingly unlikely. After six years in the New Jersey system, Kinnear signed with the expansion Atlanta Thrashers in 1999 and broke through, making his NHL debut in Montreal on Mar. 6, 2000.
He returned to the Devils in a trade in November 2000 before a back injury brought his playing career to a halt. Forced into retirement at just 27 years old, Kinnear entered the coaching game as an assistant with Albany in 2001-02.
Now in his 23rd season behind an AHL bench, Kinnear has become a fixture in the league. He stayed in Albany after the River Rats began a development partnership with the Carolina Hurricanes, and he moved to Charlotte when that affiliation moved south in 2010.
In 2016, Kinnear got his head-coaching break when the Florida Panthers hired him to lead their new affiliate, the Springfield Thunderbirds. The Panthers teamed up with Charlotte in 2020, but Kinnear spent 2020-21 overseeing their players in Syracuse as the Checkers opted out of the COVID-shortened season. He officially returned to the Queen City in 2021, and this year’s club sits at 19-8-1-2 (41 points), two points out of the top spot in the Atlantic.
They have performed well even amid a crush of injuries, taking 12 wins in their past 16 games. Friday’s 3-2 overtime victory at Wilkes-Barre/Scranton sent them into a week-long break before opening a six-game homestand on Jan. 10.
“For me, that’s really where we’ve taken off – how everyone’s bought in [with] how we want to play,” Kinnear said. “It’s been a group effort. Everyone’s contributed to the success of the group so far.”
Charlotte unquestionably has a deep cache of high-end talent. The team has far and away the top power play in the league at 30.8 percent (including 38.2 percent at home) and can turn the offense on when needed. They were down 2-0 to the Penguins on Friday before rallying to set up John Leonard’s overtime winner. But if a team takes on its head coach’s approach, the Checkers fit that description. They lead the league in scoring (3.67 goals per game). They have outshot opponents in 25 of their 30 games, allowing a league-low 24.5 shots per contest on the season. Their penalty kill ranks third in the AHL at 87.1 percent, and they have scored a league-best nine shorthanded goals.
The Checkers are a team that has its details down.
And with this many years in the business, both on the ice and behind a bench, Kinnear has developed a few non-negotiables in how he runs his team and how his players play.
“You have to respect the process,” he outlined. “You want to make sure each day that you have daily wins, and you are teaching the right way to play, what winning hockey looks like. You do that whether it’s a win, a bad game, (or) a good game that you lose. I think you just have to be consistent.”
And the Checkers are, which is why Kinnear will be off to Acrisure Arena next month.
“I’m proud of the group to date,” Kinnear said. “We have a lot of work left, but I’m very, very honored and humbled to represent the Checkers.”
On the American Hockey League beat for two decades, TheAHL.com features writer Patrick Williams also currently covers the league for NHL.com and FloSports and is a regular contributor on SiriusXM NHL Network Radio. He was the recipient of the AHL’s James H. Ellery Memorial Award for his outstanding coverage of the league in 2016.