Boston Bruins: More Changes Made In Coaching
The Boston Bruins know they were going to need to make some changes after last season. The Black and Gold had failed to reach the postseason for the second straight year. Expectations from the fans and the Jacobs family are always pretty high, and Bruins general manager Don Sweeney has announced that more changes will be happening to the Bruins coaching staff.
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Bruce Cassidy has been made an assistant coach in Boston. Cassidy has spent the last five seasons as the head coach for the Bruins AHL affiliate in Providence. He’s helped the baby Bruins make it to the playoffs for the last four years straight, and has had a winning season every year as Providence’s head coach. He leaves Providence with a 207-128-45 record.
Cassidy has been recognized as the coach that helped develop many of the Boston Bruins current roster. In the past he helped Torey Krug, Kevan Miller, David Pastrnak, and Ryan Spooner advance to their current NHL jobs. More recently, he’s helped with the development of Frank Vatrano, who is very likely to earn a more permanent berth in the Boston roster.
Cassidy will not have an easy job in front of him. He’s likely to take over coaching the defensemen, (Doug Houda was let go after last season.) and that will be an uphill battle from the start. He’ll need to put together a blue line without Torey Krug, and with increasingly limited production from Zdeno Chara and Dennis Seidenberg.
Unless the Bruins are able to make a serious move during the draft for a quality D-man, get used to seeing Adam McQuaid, Zach Trotman, Joe Morrow, and Kevan Miller attempt to play top-four minutes (to varying degrees of failure).
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Jay Pandolfo has also been given an assistant coach job. Pandolfo is coming over from the other side of the Bruins front office, spending the last two seasons there. Last year, he was the Director of Player Development (and he also had a hand in Frank Vatrano’s success). He will be moving into the position left vacant by the departure of Doug Jarvis.
Pandolfo is a two-time Stanley Cup winner (New Jersey Devils; 1999-2000, 2002-2003) with nearly 900 NHL games to his credit. He finished his NHL career with a stint in Boston.
This looks like a good change for the Boston Bruins. Both of their new coaches have experience in player development. They have a working history with many of the players. They’ll be able to bring a new voice to the locker room, while still being known as part of the Bruins family.