An off-season of change on the Los Angeles bench is complete after the hiring of the final assistant coach.
The team announced the hiring of Pierre Turgeon Monday afternoon, the fourth and final addition as assistant coach to the Kings’ bench. He specifically is dedicated to an “offensive coordinator” role, the first time the team has had that position.
“Pierre had great success as a player and has a tremendous hockey background on the whole. He is a person who brings a lot of energy, passion and insight to the job along with a great deal of enthusiasm about the game,” head coach John Stevens was quoted in a release. “We look forward to him adding to our team, and to our staff, a real team perspective from a person who was a high-end player, especially in the offensive zone. We have talked a lot during the process of building a coaching staff regarding the qualities of the people we wanted to bring aboard. We feel strongly that Pierre will help complement myself, Dave Lowry, Don Nachbaur and Bill Ranford and we are together looking forward to the start of the season.”
Turgeon was the first overall pick by Buffalo in the 1987 draft, where Brendan Shanahan went No. 2 to New Jersey. He finished with 515 goals and 1,327 points in 1,294 career games, retiring after the 2006-07 season.
After missing the playoffs for the second time in three seasons, the Kings fired GM Dean Lombardi and head coach Darryl Sutter. Rob Blake has since become the GM and Stevens was promoted from assistant to head coach.
The opportunity is Turgeon’s first chance to coach in the NHL.
[relatedlinks]