Coaches on the hot seat? Four teams that could shake things up

We’re about six weeks into the 2024-25 NHL campaign, and while this is the time we start to really figure out what teams are all about, it feels like this year features a few extra question marks thanks to some surprising underachievers.

Looking at the standings, there are teams with very real playoff expectations sitting closer to the bottom than the top and are now facing tough decisions about how to turn things around.

Unfortunately, this often means looking not just at the players, but also at the person steering the ship from behind the bench.

A coaching change can be a necessary decision to turn a losing season into a winning one, but it’s still a tough one. And in the case of these four clubs, it’s worth wondering whether we might see front offices do exactly that in an effort to jumpstart some production while the standings are still wide open.

Real Kyper and Bourne

Nick Kypreos and Justin Bourne talk all things hockey with some of the biggest names in the game. Watch live every weekday on Sportsnet and Sportsnet+ — or listen live on Sportsnet 590 The FAN — from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. ET.

Full episodes

Jim Montgomery, Boston Bruins | 8-8-2

Hired: July 1, 2022 | Overall record with BOS: 120-40-22

All eyes were on the Atlantic ahead of the 2024-25 campaign, with fans and prognosticators all trying to figure out how to fit more than five teams from the division into the Eastern Conference post-season picture, considering the collection of clubs in the mix and knocking on the door (spoiler alert: You can’t). But the opposite has happened, with a lot of underperforming teams still figuring out who they are this year.

We just didn’t expect Boston to be one of them. At a glance, things may not look so bad considering the Bruins currently sit third in the Atlantic Division — but the standings don’t exactly tell the whole story.

They’re scoring at a rate that ranks fifth-worst in the league (2.5 goals per game) and are giving up goals too often — their 3.39 goals against per game is seventh-worst. Boston’s minus-16 goal differential looks like that of a rebuilding squad, not a Cup contender. Special teams are downright abysmal, with an underperforming penalty kill (74.3 per cent) and an even worse power play that’s capitalized just 11.4 per cent of the time. We’ve watched as emotions have overflowed on the bench and listened as Montgomery tries to capture what, exactly, is going wrong in his third campaign with the club.

A perennial contender, the Bruins didn’t miss a beat when they transitioned from winning under Bruce Cassidy to winning under Jim Montgomery — they went from great to even better, in fact, posting the best regular season in NHL history in Montgomery’s first year at the helm in 2022-23. He was awarded Jack Adams honours for his efforts and has guided the club to back-to-back playoff appearances. With rumours and reports about his job security suddenly flying about, it’s a harsh reminder for everyone of what a tough business coaching can be.

Mike Sullivan, Pittsburgh Penguins | 6-10-3

Hired: Dec. 12, 2015 | Overall record with PIT: 381-229-80

Nearly a decade into his Pittsburgh tenure, Mike Sullivan is about as synonymous with the Penguins’ success as the franchise’s biggest stars.

Brought up to the big club 28 games into the 2015-16 season, Sullivan was tasked with lighting a spark after an uninspired start under Mike Johnston and instead set the league ablaze with a revitalized Penguins squad that sprinted through the rest of the season all the way to a Stanley Cup. They successfully defended their title the following spring and returned to the playoffs five more times in the five seasons that followed their title defence. Though he never claimed the Jack Adams Award as the league’s top coach, his name is always in the conversation as he’s navigated the Penguins through injuries and into contention year after year. He’s coached and won more games with Pittsburgh than any other bench boss in franchise history and is the second longest-tenured head coach in the NHL right now, behind only Tampa Bay’s Jon Cooper.

Unfortunately, there’s also a reason he’s potentially feeling the heat now. Pittsburgh has missed the last two post-seasons, and finds itself in a tough spot with a win-now core of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang that’s aging and cap constraints making it tough to build sufficiently around for one last run. Kyle Dubas opted to keep Sullivan behind the bench when he was hired as general manager in 2023, but as the team continues to drop in the standings, it’s worth wondering whether Dubas will decide to bring in his own candidate to try and light another fire.

The Penguins’ problem areas are clear — with a league-high 3.83 goals allowed per game this season, they lack a true No. 1 netminder that can win them games. They’ve already bounced through three netminders in 18 games and none have been able to stay long. Sitting well outside the playoff picture in the basement of the Metropolitan, Pittsburgh’s time to turn this season around could soon be running out.

Derek Lalonde, Detroit Red Wings | 7-8-1

Hired: June 30, 2022 | Overall record with DET: 83-77-20

It’s been eight seasons since the Detroit Red Wings last appeared in the playoffs, their incredible 25-year run of contention coming to an end in the spring of 2017 as the franchise embarked on major organizational changes and a massive roster overhaul to go with it. As we’ve watched GM Steve Yzerman retool and rebuild the roster and restock his pool of prospects, we’ve wondered when the Red Wings would be ready to re-emerge on the playoff stage.

The team is coming close — and, in the case of last spring, incredibly close — but with those few false starts, we’re still wondering. In some ways, the Red Wings feel a bit like an experiment in expectations vs. reality and whether the team we’re seeing this season so far is right on schedule or already falling behind. They’re second last in the Atlantic and sitting at .500 on the season.

Goaltending was a potential area of concern entering the season, with an aging Cam Talbot leading a largely unproven duo backing him up in Alex Lyon and Ville Husso — but netminding hasn’t been the issue here, the Red Wings posting a 10th best goals against per game (three). Not bad. That said, it’s not making up for the significant drop in offence we’ve seen this year. It’s goal-scoring that’s been harder to come by so far this fall — the team is tallying just shy of 2.5 per game through 15 contests so far, and has scored fewer even-strength markers (19) this year than any other squad. (The power play is pretty decent, ranking seventh thanks to a 25.6 per cent conversion rate.) Detroit’s penalty kill is a major struggle, ranking third worst right now (66.7 per cent).

Maybe Lalonde hasn’t exactly been provided all the tools, roster-wise, to win. But three seasons into his tenure, it’s still hard not to view this year, so far, as a disappointment — and it’s even harder to determine whether a change behind the bench would help or hurt.

Andrew Brunette, Nashville Predators | 5-10-3 (13 pts)

Hired: May 31, 2023 | Overall record with NSH: 59-40-8

Andrew Brunette has had his term cut short before — despite guiding the Florida Panthers to the Presidents’ Trophy (and himself to the list of Jack Adams finalists) as interim in 2021-22, the team released him to bring in Paul Maurice. Now in the second season of his second chance after he was handed the keys to the Nashville Predators in 2023, will Brunette have the opportunity to see this one through?

This was a franchise that looked like it was flirting with a rebuild when he was hired, but a 47-30-5 campaign last year — good for fourth in the Central and a wild card spot in the West — seemed to reroute the club. Juuse Saros signed a massive extension to stay, and a summertime shopping spree dragged the club back into the spotlight. They handed four-year and five-year deals to Steven Stamkos and Jonathan Marchessault, respectively, solidifying their situation down the middle and making a statement that the Predators are, in fact, ready to win now.

And yet, 17 games into the season, the Predators have yet to play like the star-studded club that it is. Sitting last in the Central Division, they’ve won just five games — same as San Jose, Columbus, Anaheim, and Montreal, all of whom are deep in the throes of a rebuild. They’re tied with Chicago for the fourth-fewest goals scored per game. Only three players — Filip Forsberg, Roman Josi, and Ryan O’Reilly — have hit double-digits in points. The only thing going right is the penalty kill, which is operating at a league-best 91.5 per cent rate.

The Predators have proven themselves to be a loyal organization — they’ve had just four coaches since their establishment in 1998. And just as Barry Trotz went from David Poile’s first coaching hire to his successor as GM, there’s a connection here, too, between Trotz and Brunette. Brunette was an original member of that inaugural Predators roster under Trotz, and even scored the franchise’s first-ever goal.

In any normal situation, Brunette should not be feeling the heat. But something’s gotta give if this group is to hit its stride before it’s too late, and most often that comes in the form of changes behind the bench. Will that be the case in Nashville?

More from Sportsnet

In defence of subjectivity on NHL goal reviews

Friday Four: Can McDavid become the second player ever to hit 2,000 points?