'Kind of like a secret weapon': Inside the Calgary Flames’ skating lab with Danielle Fujita

For Danielle Fujita, the summer is always a foundational part of her job. 

That’s the reality as an NHL skating coach, especially with the more condensed schedule the past couple of years. 

“The regular season, it’s all maintenance. If something needs to be tweaked or adjusted, you can try, but for me, this has been the most important time,” Fujita said. “If we have a technique that needs to be broken down or a new skill that needs to be added to the toolbox, you can really only do that in the summer.”

It’s why Fujita has spent the summer travelling, connecting with Calgary Flames players and prospects for on-ice sessions. While Fujita has regular ice in Calgary available for players, she said taking the time to visit with players at their home rinks makes a big difference going into training camp, similar to how Connor Zary launched into his NHL rookie season a couple years back after working with Fujita. 

“We have to build a foundation of understanding and how I can help them,” Fujita said. “When you get to the NHL level, it’s the smallest of tweaks and margins that make a difference. And you can’t really make small tweaks or adjustments like that if you don’t have a trust built before.”

Fujita has worked with the Flames since the 2018-19 season, first as a skating consultant working with the NHL roster, before moving into a full-time role with Calgary before the 2022-23 season, working with both NHLers and Flames prospects. 

It’s a connection that started through current Flames general manager Craig Conroy, whose daughter worked with Fujita through figure skating lessons. 

“Danielle’s been awesome for us, kind of like a secret weapon,” Conroy said earlier this month while watching the Hlinka Gretzky Cup. “It’s something that, for us, has been awesome to see someone really help and push us to be better in that area.”

A former figure skater, Fujita spent close to two decades coaching figure skating, but hockey was always something she wanted to work toward, particularly power skating and working with elite players on adding more power and quickness. 

“It’s funny, I never would have dreamed of as a 15-year-old coaching in the NHL. I was focused on figure skating, and wanted to pursue that at the high level. Maybe I would have said ‘that [would] be cool,’ to coach, but it wasn’t something that really showed up for me until later,” Fujita said. “But as I gained confidence in this area, coaching hockey and skating, I really decided to go for it, and the Flames gave me that chance.”

While coaching is her main responsibility, Conroy said Fujita is a valuable resource for all of hockey operations. For example, while she doesn’t do direct scouting, the Flames scouting department will ask her opinion on prospects and their skating ability, and more importantly, what work can realistically be done to help a player take the next step. 

And that’s one of the biggest parts of Fujita’s job: helping players take the next step in their skating ability to reach or better thrive at a higher level. 

“When it comes to younger players, the prospects, it’s really exciting because you kind of get to work and learn with them on what they believe about skating,” Fujita said. “Players have reached where they are for a reason, so part of my job is helping them find what works for them. They’ll have ideas, I have ideas, and I think one of the big things for me is a conversation and testing for those players what works best.”

Fujita says those conversations early in a player’s career can lead to better trust in the future, and help solve problems during the season. For example, Fujita said sometimes players, particularly veteran players, might end up reverting to older bad habits in late November or December, when the season has become more condensed, which is when it’s her job to help get things back on track. 

“There’s not a lot of time, so it’s often something at the end of practice for five minutes, maybe looking at a stride, or pulling old video of what a player was doing well before and what they might have gotten away from,” Fujita said. “You kind of take those small tweaks, those moments to help get back to some of the things they built before.”