The NHL has one female assistant coach. Allie LaCombe visits Canes camp hoping to follow

Allie LaCombe’s bio on her X.com account is succinct: “coffee, hockey, travel, repeat. you betcha, y’all. skills coach/team coach.”

There’s a sense of speed and urgency about it, describing someone with little time to spare and a lot she wants to do.

This past week, LaCombe has been at the Carolina Hurricanes’ prospects development camp. Invited to join the camp’s coaching staff, she has been on the ice at Invisalign Arena with Cam Abbott, the new Chicago Wolves head coach in the AHL; and development coaches Daniel Bochner, Peter Harrold and Jason Muzzatti. Former Canes assistant coach Kevin McCarthy also has offered his observations.

And Rod Brind’Amour. The Canes’ head coach and assistant coach Jeff Daniels have been on the ice directing the young players.

LaCombe has been easy to spot. She quickly moved from station to station during on-ice drills, providing expertise to the young prospects about their skating, their balance and posture, their weight shift, their edge work and feet drive.

“It’s development for the coaches, as well,” LaCombe said. “It’s a great learning opportunity for everyone involved. It’s great to feed off each other, to learn, to coach outside your comfort zone.

“I don’t think about gender when I’m teaching. I teach the same way, boys and girls. If I need to push and get on them I’m going to get on them the same way, and it builds mutual respect both ways.”

Working the Canes camp was not a first for LaCombe, 31, who is co-founder, assistant hockey director and head coach for the Nashville Warriors Hockey Club in Nolensville, Tennessee. She also has been a guest coach at the Vancouver Canucks’ development camp.

LaCombe is a member of the NHLCA Female Coaches Program, an initiative aimed at providing coaches more skills development, leadership strategies and career advancement opportunities.

“I’d love to keep growing in my coaching career and move up to the pros,” she said. “Hopefully I’ll get that opportunity to move up and keep continuing on.

“The sky’s the limit. Just look at Jessica Campbell.”

The Seattle Kraken recently announced Campbell has been hired as an assistant coach on Dan Bylsma’s new staff and will be behind the bench this season – an NHL first. Campbell, 32, previously worked with Bylsma with the Coachella Valley Firebirds, the Kraken’s AHL affiliate.

“She’s breaking barriers,” LaCombe said. “She has a really good run in the AHL and I’d like to continue that path one day and kind of follow in her footsteps.

“I think the game is moving toward getting more females involved. I think we bring a different kind of skill set, too, whether it’s personality or different outlook or a different voice, at times.”

LaCombe, who learned the sport growing up in Minnesota, played college hockey at Syracuse. She played professional hockey in Europe and was with the Connecticut Whale of the National Women’s Hockey League for a season.

While retired as a player, LaCombe has a cousin, Jackson LaCombe, who is a defenseman for the Anaheim Ducks.

Now, it’s all about coaching, trying to move up.

“I think just growing the game in general is awesome and I’d like to get a job for what I do, not because I’m a girl but because I earned that,” LaCombe said.

A year ago, the Canes had Alyssa Gagliardi working the development staff at the prospects camp. Gagliardi said she just wanted to be seen as just another coach on the staff, adding “tools to the toolbox” for the players and offering her input.

Gagliardi worked with the Canes as a girls’ and women’s youth hockey specialist and has served on the board of directors of the Professional Women’s Hockey League Players Association (PWHLPA). She’s an assistant coach with the Rochester Junior Americans of the NAHL.

“It’s good to get other coaches around and hear how they do things,” Brind’Amour said. “You pick up from everybody, on the skills and the skating and that stuff. … It’s all about trying to get better and the only way to do that is to bring in other people who have expertise.

“Hopefully, at some point, we’ll stop talking about (gender) but that they’re there on their merits.”