Kurt Kleinendorst takes a fatherly approach to coaching.

"When they need a pat on the back, they get a pat on the back," he said of his team members. "And when they need a kick in the rear, they get a kick in the rear."

Kleinendorst was named head coach of USA Hockey's National Team Development Program in Ann Arbor on Tuesday. He replaces John Hynes, who resigned earlier this month to accept the assistant coach position for the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins of the American Hockey League.

“I feel like 23 17-year-olds will now become my sons,” said Kleinendorst, who spent the past three seasons as the head coach of the American Hockey League’s Lowell Devils. 

The familial approach is one the seasoned Kleinendorst has been exercising for 20 years. He has coached in the Ice Hockey Superleague (in Britian), in the American Hockey League and for an affiliate of the National Hockey League.

Kleinendorst also has USA Hockey roots. He was a member of Team USA at the 1981 IIHF Men's World Championship.

“It’s all those experiences that I’ve had coming in that will come together,” said Kleinendorst. “I can’t say that I have all the answers because I don’t know what the questions are. There will be new challenges, but any coach at any level will have to be a problem solver. I find that to be one of the nicer challenges of the program.

“I’ll let things fall and just do the best job that I can with the cards that I’ve been dealt,” he added.

Speaking just hours after being named the USA NTDP head coach, Kleinendorst has yet to see his ‘hand’. But when he does, he knows what he’ll expect.

“My expectations will always be to get the very most out of them,” he said. However, “I have to see for myself exactly where a 17-year-old is at.”

Kleinendorst and the USA NTDP's first game is Sept. 18 against the University of Waterloo (Ontario, Canada). Game time is 7:05 p.m. at the Ann Arbor Ice Cube.