"Obviously, a lot more comfortable, a lot more relaxed," Trotz told NHL.com. "Last year was a whirlwind, winning the Cup [with the Washington Capitals] and then all the things that go with that, and then making the change.
"My family stayed back in D.C. until I think the third week of November. I was in an empty house with a bed and a TV. No furniture."
That didn't prevent Trotz from winning the Jack Adams Award as the top coach in the NHL for the second time in four seasons after guiding the Islanders to a second-place finish in the Metropolitan Division (48-27-7). New York swept the Pittsburgh Penguins in the Eastern Conference First Round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs before being swept by the Carolina Hurricanes in the second round.
In a wide-ranging interview with NHL.com, Trotz discussed his first season in New York, the signing of captain Anders Lee to a seven-year contract and the future of forwards Michael Dal Colle and Joshua Ho-Sang.
How crazy was it for you last summer after being named coach of the Islanders?
"My oldest daughter got married, she had a wedding in Hawaii and a reception in Nashville, and in between I had a Cup date in Dauphin, Manitoba. And then I'm trying to find a house to live in and getting to know the organization. All of that was in within probably a 40-day window. I showed up a couple of days before rookie camp, and the first time I got together with all of my coaches was (September) 4th or 5th. We started three days later. It was hectic."
How did things come together so quickly?
"Part of the greatness of being on the Island is it's a smaller community; all of the players live within a couple miles of each other. It really promotes that family sort of atmosphere without being engulfed by the big city. I didn't know anything about that. Obviously, I had a pretty good pedigree going in there after winning the Cup. They had a real good base in terms of they're really good people, and that's where you start. We had the buy-in that we were going to be better in terms of our preparation, our structure, we were going to clean up the defensive part of our game, because it couldn't get any worse from what everybody was telling me, and the stats backed that up. That team was really close on and off the ice. A lot of guys in my exit interviews said it was the one of the most pleasurable years in terms of fun, the type of guys that we had and how we promoted that."