Colorado Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar is the clear favorite to win this season's Jack Adams Award, which is given to the league's top coach, but the Buffalo Sabres' Lindy Ruff may be emerging as a sleeper candidate.
David Quadrelli and Irfaan Gaffar of Daily Faceoff conducted an anonymous poll of NHL executives, agents and players. Ruff, whose Sabres sit ninth in the Eastern Conference after a recent hot streak, received the third most responses behind Bednar and Jon Cooper of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
"If the Sabres make the playoffs, their coach wins it," an NHL executive said.
Buffalo hasn't skated in a Stanley Cup Playoff game since 2011, when Ruff was still in his first stint behind the Blue and Gold bench. He returned to the organization in 2024 after stops with the Dallas Stars, New York Rangers and New Jersey Devils.
The 65-year-old Canadian coach, who also spent most of his playing career with the Sabres, ranks fourth in NHL history with 922 coaching wins.
Lindy Ruff going from the hot seat to the Jack Adams conversation highlights the Buffalo Sabres' remarkable turnaround
Last month, when the Sabres fired general manager Kevyn Adams and promoted Jarmo Kekalainen to take over the front office, there was immediate speculation about Ruff's future. In many instances, a GM prefers to pick his own coach.
Kekalainen decided to stick with Ruff and, at least so far, the decision has paid off.
Buffalo embarked on a 10-game winning streak to vault from the East basement into the postseason race, and it's won 11 of its past 12 games overall. The team's 22-15-4 record at the 2025-26 season's halfway mark equates to a 96-point pace.
The Sabres' success is buoyed by a 13-5-2 record at the KeyBank Center, and Ruff recently credited the team's diehard fanbase, which has continued to support the organization despite its longstanding struggles, for helping spark the recent run.
"The energy was great in the building, and I think that's something these guys need to experience," Ruff told reporters after a 5-3 win over the Vancouver Canucks. "I mean, I think the building was behind us, and it's a lift when you're sitting behind the bench."
Now the question is whether Buffalo's vastly improved play can be maintained for the entire second half of the regular season. The franchise has enjoyed promising stretches at times throughout the drought only to eventually fall back into its losing ways.
Meanwhile, Jack Adams Award voting tends to go in one of two directions: a head coach whose team steamrolls the competition all season, as has been the case for Bednar's Avs, or one who leads an underdog team to far greater heights than expected.
Ruff obviously falls in the latter category and, while simply making the playoffs is a low bar, it's one that's been virtually impossible to jump for the Sabres since Terry Pegula purchased the team in 2011.
It's tough to say whether that's actually enough to generate the necessary voting support to beat out Bednar and Cooper, who's done a brilliant job guiding the injury-riddled Lightning through tough waters to remain atop the East, for the Jack Adams Award.
Ruff, who previously won the coveted coaching trophy in 2006, definitely belongs in the discussion if Buffalo finally leaves the drought in the rearview mirror, though.