Today, the Calgary Flames joined the growing list of NHL teams looking for a new Head Coach.
Ottawa, Calgary and Anaheim all need somebody behind the bench. The Minnesota Wild could soon join that list too depending on what they plan to do with interim Head Coach John Torchetti. It’s a list that could continue to grow as the off-season progresses.
For Ottawa Senators General Manager Pierre Dorion, that means things are getting increasingly competitive on the Coaching market.
Pierre LeBrun was on TSN1200 this afternoon and provided some insight into Ottawa’s search to this point. According to LeBrun, Dorion has spoke with a number of candidates with some of the interviews running between three and four hours in length.
That’s a great sign and certainly indicates that Dorion understands just how important this hire is for the organization.
The interview process is a great opportunity to gain a variety of different perspectives about your team. It allows you to speak to top coaching minds from around the hockey world and find out exactly what they would do if they were behind the bench for your team. You can only hire one person in the end but the insights gained during this process can be extremely useful for the Management group going forward.
Nice to see the Senators making the most of this opportunity.
Now with that said, you certainly don’t want the Sens to be so methodical that they miss out on the best candidate.
To date, we know that they’ve talked to Mike Yeo on a couple of occasions. They’ve also talked to Guy Boucher, Marc Crawford, Kevin Dineen and Randy Carlyle. They’ve also talked to Benoit Groulx but I really think that’s about the job in Binghamton.
Bob Hartley checks off some of the boxes the Senators are looking for in a possible Head Coach and they’ll probably speak to him although LeBrun mentioned that he’s not convinced the interest on that front is all that serious. I think they would have liked to talk to John Stevens but the Kings seem reluctant to let him go. And Kirk Muller would be of interest but he’s still busy in St. Louis.
And as we found out earlier today, they have officially contacted the Anaheim Ducks about Bruce Boudreau. That discussion is expected to happen this week. The Senators may not be alone on that front though as Wild GM Chuck Fletcher may have been in California to talk to him this week.
Dorion clearly has plenty of irons in the fire right now and is doing everything he can to make sure he makes the right choice.
He may want to hone in on that candidate in the not too distant future though because the Coaching market is heating up around the league.
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