Oh my God this is awful. Red was such a gift to the game. Not one minute spent talking to him was ever wasted. This is devastating. https://twitter.com/smclaughlin9/status/1380600747079954434

I really hate when people turn someone else's death (and their family's tragedy) into something about them, but I feel like my favorite Red Gendron story is a fun insight into who he was.

He did a phone interview with me when he was first hired at Maine - a very much bog-standard "tell me about your plans for the program, team identity, expectations" kind of thing. But somehow we got to talking about books.

I kid you not, the call lasted an hour, and only 20 minutes at most was actually about coaching the Maine men's hockey team. He went on and on about books that he had read about leadership, both within and outside of the universe of sports. Sun Tzu was in the mix.

And anyone who ever talked 1-on-1 with Red knows how this went. You couldn't ever expect to just get 5 minutes with him, and you had to be prepared to talk about anything, because he could talk about EVERYTHING.

Somewhere right now in the Great Beyond, Red is talking St. Peter's ear off about Machiavelli or John Wooden (hell, he might be talking John Wooden's ear off about John Wooden.)

Here's to Red Gendron.