Long story short, the way we interpret this is that the Rangers want a strong developmental coach who is self-aware enough to acknowledge the fact that he needs to hire strong assistants and trust them to do their job, two traits that weren’t necessarily strong points of Alain Vigneault. Further, both Gorton and Dolan mentioning that they will be open-minded with the coaching search and don’t necessarily want to go after a retread coach, music to our ears here at Blueshirts Breakaway, has really opened the pool of candidates that reporters, bloggers and fans alike can have fun speculating about.
Many Rangers fans and writers alike are salivating over the thought of Toronto Marlies (AHL) head coach Sheldon Keefe taking over the mantle as the new coach of the team. Keefe is known as an excellent developmental coach with progressive views on the game and someone that builds strong working relationships with his players but isn’t afraid to be a disciplinarian when needed. He’s been profiled and written about in multiple places, and Scott Wheeler, a great prospects writer that also covers the Toronto Marlies for The Athletic, wrote a detailed profile about Keefe and made a recent appearance on the Blueshirts Breakaway podcast where he shared fantastic insight about Sheldon Keefe the coach and the person—a must listen for all Ranger fans. A number of Rangers-specific publications also recently wrote about Keefe, including ourselves, Blueshirt Banter, Blue Line Station and Brooklyn Sports Guy, and he’s been speculated to be a candidate for the job by multiple beat writers, including Larry Brooks. We share the same thoughts on Keefe that have been echoed by many Ranger fans and writers since it became evident it was time to move on from Alain Vignauelt: hire Sheldon Keefe.
However, any smart organization has to interview multiple candidates, and it would be foolish to hitch your wagon to only one option without doing your due diligence. In this piece, Drew Way and Shawn Taggart discuss some non-Sheldon Keefe options that the Rangers either should consider, or have been linked to in rumors, for the head coaching vacancy. For the record, this is not an exhaustive list by any means, and there are a number of great options out there that are not detailed in this article, such as Scott Sandelin (University of Minnesota Duluth), Rand Pecknold (Quinnipiac University), Pascal Vincent (Manitoba Moose) and others.[/text_output]
Jim Montgomery captained the University of Maine team to the 1993 NCAA championship, and was named NCAA Tournament Championship MVP. He had a solid rookie season with the St. Louis Blues in 1993-94, but then got traded to the Montreal Canadians and his career struggled to take off from there. One fun fact about Montgomery’s tenure in the NHL, is that he signed with the Flyers after being released by the Canadians during the 94-95 season, and was credited with nicknaming the infamous John LeClair—Eric Lindros—Mikael Renberg line the “Legion of Doom.”
He’d go on to make a few more appearances in the NHL, KHL and UHL before eventually retiring in 2005 and joining the Notre Dame staff as an assistant coach. From there, he’d go on to a four-year stint as an assistant at RPI, before being named head coach and general manager of the Dubuque Fighting Saints in 2010, which at the time was an expansion team in the USHL. In his three years with Dubuque, the Fighting Saints would win the Clark Cup (championship) twice, with the second coming in 2013, a year in which the team’s best player won rookie of the year: Johnny Gaudreau. In 2013, Montgomery was named the head coach for the University of Denver, a title he still currently holds, and during his five-year tenure the school has earned five straight NCAA tournament appearances, two Frozen Four appearances and won the 2017 NCAA National Championship. Further, Henrik Borgström, the 23rd overall pick in the 2016 NHL draft of the Florida Panthers, has truly blossomed under the tutelage of Montgomery. While at Denver, Borgström has made the progression from a highly-scrutinized first round pick that had dynamic offensive ability but serious questions about his physicality and defensive ability into one of the best center prospects in the entire NHL.
Friend of the podcast Sean Shapiro, who covers the Dallas Stars for The Athletic, wrote a fantastic profile on Jim Montgomery and his potential candidacy for the head coaching vacancy in Dallas. I’m not even going to attempt to match what Sean did in this article; this piece is intended to be more of a quick reference guide than a full-length profile, but I highly recommend anyone interested in learning more about Montgomery to check that piece out.
However, as far as the highlights for what you should know about Jim Montgomery’s coaching style, I’ll say first and foremost, he reminds me a lot of John Tortorella, minus the bombastic press conferences after bad losses. Above all else, Montgomery is known as a culture guy who can be brought in to instill a sense of pride, brotherhood and professionalism in a team, much like what Torts did in his first few years with the Rangers. He’s been known as someone who gets along with his players well and has their backs at all times, but also is not afraid to be a stern disciplinarian when needed. He’s detail-oriented, believes in the importance of playing a physical game that includes taking the body and blocking shots, and he employs an aggressive 2-1-2 forechecking scheme that relies on skating and puck pressure to attempt to force turnovers and generate offense. Sound familiar Ranger fans?
Do I believe Jim Montgomery is the perfect head coaching candidate? No. Personally, I view this coaching search similar to how I view the upcoming draft, with Rasmus Dahlin and Sheldon Keefe being on a clear top tier of their own, and then a few options after that could also be very successful in the NHL, but are clear consolation prizes to the top pick as they all have at least one clear flaw. Personally, I’m not a big fan of running a system committed to blocking shots. I’m not saying you should avoid blocking shots, that would be ridiculous. But I do not like teams that go out of their way to block shots, as it often leads to weird deflections on your own goal, screening your own goalie who easily could’ve made the save if he had a clear sight on the puck, or worse case, taking the puck off an unpadded area, leading to an injury.
All that said, Montgomery is a guy the Rangers could bring in to instill a strong culture, develop the youth and commit to a hard-nosed style of play that could complement some of the top-end talent that (hopefully) the team brings in and develops. I’m not sure if Jim Montgomery is a coach that the Rangers could bring in and then win a Stanley Cup in the next few seasons. However, much like John Tortorella was for the Rangers, I think Montgomery is a guy you can bring in, that sets the table perfectly for the next guy that you bring in that can carry the team over the top.[/text_output][custom_headline type=”left” level=”h6″ looks_like=”h6″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]David Quinn – Head Coach, Boston University Terriers (NCAA)[/custom_headline][image type=”circle” float=”none” link=”true” target=”blank” info=”tooltip” info_place=”bottom” info_trigger=”hover” src=”2486″ alt=”Photo Credit: Angela Rowlings” href=”https://www.blueshirtsbreakaway.com/” title=”Photo Credit: Angela Rowlings” info_content=”Photo Credit: Angela Rowlings” lightbox_caption=”” id=”” class=”aligncenter” style=””][text_output]David Quinn is currently the head coach of Boston University and was recently named head coach for Team USA in the 2019 World Junior Championships. His name has been thrown around the rumor mill multiple times since the Rangers have fired Alain Vigneault, including Elliotte Friedman on his 31 Thoughts Podcast with Jeff Marek, Craig Custance in his NHL Coaching Tracker article, and Larry Brooks, who wrote an entire article on how Quinn’s nomination as the US WJC team coach won’t affect his candidacy as the potential next bench boss for the Rangers.
David Quinn is a fine option to interview as the Rangers do their due diligence in search of their next head coach, and I like the fact that the Rangers definitely seemed committed to going with a fresher perspective to run the team as opposed to an old retread like Daryl Sutter or Dan Bylsma. That said, I think it’s a mixed bag when you look at Quinn’s coaching traits, and in my opinion, he’s multiple tiers below Sheldon Keefe, and a tier beneath Jim Montgomery.
Quinn was a first round pick of the Minnesota North Stars back in 1984 and played three seasons at Boston University before being diagnosed with a rare blood disorder, Hemophilia B, which forced him to retire from playing the game he loved. He attempted to make a comeback a few years later, and was given his first professional contract by the Rangers in 1992, but he was never able to crack an NHL roster and retired for good after the 92-93 season. He then immediately turned his attention to coaching, joining Northeastern University as an assistant before joining the University of Nebraska-Omaha’s staff as the top assistant and head recruiter to help establish the school as a Division I hockey program. After six years at Omaha, he left to become the coach for the US National Team Developmental Program, a great notch in the belt of any coach being billed as a developer of talent.
Quinn then had a brief stint as an assistant coach at his alma mater, Boston University, before being introduced as the head coach of the Lake Erie Monsters, which is the Colorado Avalanche’s AHL affiliate. In 2012, Quinn graduated to the level of an assistant coach for the Avalanche, and the following season he obtained a job he had long sought, the head coach of the Boston University Terriers, a position he currently holds. After a poor initial season, BU has made four straight NCAA tournament appearance, and one frozen four (2015) where they lost in the championship to Providence in the finals.
Boston University is one of the top hockey programs in the NCAA, and Quinn has had the opportunity to coach and help develop a number of NHL talents during his tenure, including Charlie McAvoy, Clayton Keller and Jack Eichel. Perhaps David Quinn’s best trait as a coach is he is not afraid to play talented underclassmen over more experienced upperclassmen, a trait that is rare among college and pro hockey coaches, and a trait that many Rangers fans wished Alain Vigneault had more of. Quinn is also undoubtedly a good talent developer. Sure, he is an excellent recruiter, and many of the successful NHL players coached arrived to BU as a top-tier talent. But anyone who follows any professional sport knows that it takes a lot of work and development to turn most dominant high school players to successful professional players, and David Quinn has done an excellent job in furthering the development of his top recruits. So, if the Rangers are serious about a focus on player development going forward, then you could do much worse than David Quinn.
That said, Quinn does have a number of red flags that give me pause. First and foremost, despite having reached four straight NCAA tournament appearances, one could argue that BU has underachieved during Quinn’s tenure. For a team as routinely loaded with NHL-caliber talent as BU, they only have one final four appearance, which was the 2015 team that had freshman phenom Jack Eichel and seven additional players that had already been drafted by NHL teams, including three top-100 picks and now Boston Bruins defenseman Matt Grzelcyk, who captained the team.
When you watch Boston University play, which admittedly I have not personally done a lot myself outside of the NCAA tournament, you see a team that just doesn’t seem to have any particular system in place. While I don’t necessarily think you need to be like Alain Vigneault and try to jam round pegs into your square-holed system come hell or high water, you do want to see some semblance of structure when you watch a team, and I personally have seen very little of that. I think Nick Mercadante, an extremely intelligent hockey mind, writer for Hockey-Graphs and Rangers fan, put it best last week when he tweeted the following when asked why he is not high on David Quinn as a potential coaching option for the Rangers, “his teams routinely get gameplanned and basically rely on raw ability to get by. Very, very one-dimensional.” Again, I am not someone that has watched a ton of BU hockey, so this very well could be confirmation bias on my end, but what Nick tweeted out aligns very closely with what I’ve personally seen.
Long story short, I think David Quinn is a fine option in terms of player developmental coaching options, but he’d be far down my list in terms of hockey strategists or tacticians. When you roll up the good with the bad, my overall opinion on David Quinn is I wouldn’t be mad if he were hired as the next head coach of our beloved New York Rangers, but I certainly wouldn’t be jumping for joy either. I’d absolutely take Sheldon Keefe over him, and would also rather go with a number of other AHL or college options before Quinn as well, such as Jim Montgomery, Todd Nelson, Pascal Vincent, Rand Pecknold and Scott Sandelin. That said, I’d certainly rather give Quinn a shot over NHL retreads like Daryl Sutter, Dan Bylsma or Dave Tippett.[/text_output][custom_headline type=”center” level=”h4″ looks_like=”h4″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]Shawn Taggart[/custom_headline][custom_headline type=”left” level=”h6″ looks_like=”h6″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]Todd Nelson – Head Coach, Grand Rapids Griffins (Detroit Red Wings AHL Affiliate)[/custom_headline][image type=”circle” float=”none” link=”true” target=”blank” info=”tooltip” info_place=”bottom” info_trigger=”hover” src=”2487″ alt=”Photo Credit: Brandon Folsom, Special to the Free Press” href=”https://www.blueshirtsbreakaway.com/” title=”Photo Credit: Brandon Folsom, Special to the Free Press” info_content=”Photo Credit: Brandon Folsom, Special to the Free Press” lightbox_caption=”” id=”” class=”aligncenter” style=””][text_output]Nelson is looking to add another Calder Cup to his list of accolades in a short period of time with the Griffins. He has done a lot in a short period of time there, since Jeff Blashill took over the Detroit Red Wings after Mike Babcock took a job in Toronto.
With Nelson, he has a lot of resemblance to the style coach of Barry Trotz but understands how to properly utilize talent and most importantly, force the opposing team to make mistakes in their own end leading to turn overs.
In an interview back in 2014 with the Edmonton Journal, Nelson was stated as saying, “Barry had a very big influence on me because I thought that his coaching style was fair and honest and he held us accountable. I’m not exactly the same as Barry but I kind of modeled my coaching style after him; he was very influential.”
Cool.
He has done quite a job for himself for taking that style coaching and elevating it.
In a 2017 interview with Craig Custance at the Athletic, he stated “Why not try to dictate play? That goes along with my system work, that goes along with my philosophy. I hate the term, ‘Let’s weather the storm.’ I hate that because you’re in a defensive mode versus ‘We fight fire with fire’ and we’re going to jam it down their throat.”
He’s more of a strike first type of coach, than a wait and see what happens. Which is a style that with the Rangers are currently structured they need to be careful with.
With the young guys back on defense, if they get caught up in the play, the continuation of odd-man rushes, and breakaway attempts on Henrik Lundqvist will continue. The defensive play is something that will need to be shored up and become a strength.
There is no doubt in my mind that the can catch up to the play, the problem is that they might become too aggressive. In the same interview with Custance, Nelson talks about having the players buy into his system, which he currently runs as a 2-1-2. Without a buy in the players are going to give it 50%, meaning that players need to commit to the system, to be successful.
What I like about his is his willingness to try things out, to be innovative. He ran a 5 forward powerplay unit, that up his powerplay percentage 11 points (15% to 26%). He embraces analytics but knows that he needs other aspects of the game to make sure they are aligned to what he is seeing in terms on ice performance.[/text_output][custom_headline type=”left” level=”h6″ looks_like=”h6″ accent=”true” id=”” class=”” style=””]Ted Donato – Head Coach, Harvard Crimson (NCAA)[/custom_headline][image type=”circle” link=”true” target=”blank” info=”tooltip” info_place=”bottom” info_trigger=”hover” src=”2488″ alt=”Photo Credit: Stew Milne, AP” href=”https://www.blueshirtsbreakaway.com/” title=”Photo Credit: Stew Milne, AP” info_content=”Photo Credit: Stew Milne, AP” lightbox_caption=”” id=”” class=”aligncenter” style=””][text_output]Ted Donato, father of Ryan, coach of Harvard University’s men’s hockey club since retiring from the NHL after the 2003-2004 season is a candidate that I have had my eyes on for quite a bit. His 49-game stint with the Rangers in 2002-2003 didn’t give you a taste of what he was as a player, since it was the twilight of his career but since becoming a coach for Harvard, he has used his knowledge of the game and has done quite well molding some of the youngsters that have played for him.
His biggest achievement as head coach of Harvard is making it to the Frozen Four back in 2016-2017, but he brings an interesting style and has coached current Ranger Jimmy Vesey during his time in Harvard, so if someone should understand his coaching style and what he can bring to the table, its Vesey.
Some of the things I like about Donato is how he coaches and teaches to the players while on the bench. This will be an asset to the Rangers youth as they continue to grow into the professionals that they will become. While I think that this is something all college coaches are good at, it’s good to see someone take their time on the bench and work with them to help improve their game as it goes on.
While I feel Donato will be a good coach for the Rangers right now in the path that they are trying to lead into, I think there are some faults and some things that we may have to consider with him.
He doesn’t have the coaching pedigree that some other candidates may have. Yes, he’s coached the Harvard men’s team since 2004 but, he’s led them to one Frozen Four appearance over that time. The teams he has coach has struggled mightily except for that one season. That could easily be because of the conference they play in but it’s something to still consider.
He has molded some very good men, who have become professionals here in the NHL. He has the tools to get you to where you want initially but, you’re going to want someone who can take you to the next step.[/text_output]
Author: BSB Staff
This Article is presented to you in High Definition Surround Sound by some or all of the Blueshirts Breakaway Staff. At least whoever wasn’t lazy enough to contribute.