Grant Standbrook was one of the architects behind the University of Maine’s rise to men’s ice hockey prominence and the Black Bears’ two NCAA Division I championships. He was an assistant coach for 21 years at UMaine and the recruiting coordinator.
Now his granddaughter is going to try to help the UMaine women’s ice hockey team become an NCAA championship contender.
Emily Bruns, who has spent the past two years working with the National Hockey League’s Chicago Blackhawks, has been hired as an assistant coach along with former Lindenwood University (Missouri) men’s club hockey assistant Trey Flesch.
The 26-year-old Bruns, from Edina, Minnesota, is the daughter of Jill Standbrook and Joe Bruns, and spent a lot of time in the Bangor area while growing up attending hockey camps involving her grandfather.
“I’m really excited. The University of Maine was like an extended family for me. It’s very surreal to be coming back,” Bruns said.
Bruns worked in community relations with the Blackhawks and has coached players of all ages. She worked closely with Kevin Delaney, the founder of Delaney Hockey, which develops players of all different ages in the Chicago area.
“It was a great experience for me,” Bruns said.
“She has a pretty special hockey mind,” UMaine head coach Richard Reichenbach said. “She loves working with players and developing them.”
Bruns played hockey at Edina High School but a concussion she sustained her senior year prevented her from trying to play in college.
She attended Columbia College in Chicago and while trying to find a casual league to play in at a local rink, the rink manager invited her to coach in the youth program.
“(Grant) said I was going to love it and I should try it. I worked at the rink for five years, and it was a very good experience. And I coached a couple of girls teams in the area,” Bruns said.
She earned her degree, and after working with the Blackhawks returned to Minnesota before deciding to attend the American Hockey Coaches Association convention in Naples, Florida, to do some networking this past April.
That’s where she learned about the UMaine job opening.
She said her grandfather, a University of Maine Sports Hall of Fame inductee, was excited when he learned she was heading to UMaine. She said he has been a “huge influence” in her life and development as a coach.
“The big thing he has taught me is to learn the little details. That’s real important,” Bruns said. “He also told me to be a sponge. It’s always good to get multiple viewpoints and learn as much as you can from different people.”
Bruns said she was 5 years old when she began attending hockey clinics in Orono, and she looks forward to working with college players and a UMaine team that is coming off a dramatic turnaround season that saw the Black Bears nationally ranked for six weeks.
UMaine won a Hockey East playoff series for the first time, topping Boston University in three games in the quarterfinals. The Black Bears finished 19-14-5 overall, 11-9-4 in the conference after going 20-44-3 and 12-34-2 in the two previous years combined.
“I’m close in age with them so it will be more of a mentor relationship,” Bruns said.
One of her first stops upon her return may be to where she and her grandfather spent a lot of quality time.
“Pat’s Pizza,” she said.
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