The National Hockey League announced today that Buffalo Sabres head coach Lindy Ruff has been named a finalist for the Jack Adams Award. Ruff joins Peter Laviolette (Carolina Hurricanes) and Tom Renney (New York Rangers) as three coaches who were "adjudged to have contributed the most to his team's success."

The longest tenured coach in the league, Ruff received his first nomination for the award after guiding Buffalo to a 52-24-6 record for 110 points, a 25-point improvement from 2003-04. Buffalo's 52 overall wins and 25 victories away from HSBC Arena both set franchise records.

"(The nomination) represents a coaching staff that did a heck of a job from top to bottom, and a team that has really worked well together all season," Ruff said following practice on Thursday. "That goes from ownership all the way down to our video coach."