No surprise - Olver hired by Wildcats

Northern Michigan has found their man to replace Dave Shyiak and to many, it comes as no shock that John Olver is the Wildcats' new associate head coach under Walt Kyle.

Shyiak left Northern on June 14 to become head coach of the University of Alaska Anchorage.

"This is a major move for our program," Kyle said in an NMU press release. "With Dave leaving, I thought we would have a difficult time finding someone with that kind of experience and ability. But we found it in John. He's one of my closest friends and I have used him as a resource for recruiting. He already has some experience with the program. John has experience with many different areas of hockey which will help the program."

Olver, the head coach and vice-president of hockey operations for the Idaho Steelheads of the ECHL since 2000, is the the father of Wildcat junior icer and team leading scorer Darin Olver. His younger son, Mark, just completed two seasons playing for the Marquette Electricians midget AAA hockey team and has verbally committed to attend and play hockey for NMU beginning with the 2006-07 season.

Read the story from the Mining Journal here.