As I set out to write this in mid-February 2022, the first idea was the concept of the “new coach bounce,” why it happens, and what players could expect when they’re on a team that changes horses mid-fight. The focus would be on the Montreal Canadiens (and Edmonton Oilers).
But then I realized that in mid-February 2021 — in the ballpark of one clean year ago — I wrote this article titled “What usually happens when a team changes its coach mid-season.” I knew the idea sounded familiar. The focus was on … the Montreal Canadiens, who had just fired Claude Julien, and had to change horses mid-fight.
Boy it’s been some kinda year since then, hasn’t it?
At the time of that 2021 writing, here was the state of affairs for that Habs team. I wrote:
The Canadiens are currently top-five in shot attempts percentage (Corsi) in the NHL and are third in the NHL in straight up shots percentage. At 5-on-5 they’ve posted some of the best stats in hockey (though we’ll consider divisional weakness here for context):
The Montreal Canadiens, who just fired their coach, are the best team in the league at 5v5 whether you look at expected goals or ACTUAL goals. They are bad on special teams, as they have been for years.
Firing the head coach seems… odd. #GoHabsGo pic.twitter.com/xKo4IrvNjW
— JFresh (@JFreshHockey) February 24, 2021
Overall, of every shot taken in their games, Montreal gets some 54 per cent of them. They’re also on the positive side of the ledger in expected goals percentage (all strengths), if you’re into such measurements.
I went on to add:
There are cases on both sides of “should they or shouldn’t they have done it?” You can say the team struggled to adapt and their special teams never got better. You can argue that second part is a big deal and somewhat within the coach’s control, but you can also use it to make a pretty good LOFT argument, too. You can say goaltending undid Julien, or that the goaltending wasn’t supported by the players Julien chose to play most.
Whatever you choose to say, Julien is gone, the Habs have a winning percentage of .611 and sit in a playoff spot, and this season is far from over.
“LOFT,” as referenced in that article, stands for “Lack of (bleeping) talent,” something I had been referring to about top-end game breakers.
So a year ago the Habs were off to a torrid offensive start and a .611 winning percentage and fired their coach. They went to the Cup Final later that year after hiring a guy who was already on the bench. That is decidedly NOT where things are at now with that team, where some of the problems they already had then (namely that lack of said top talent) was decimated by the loss of 1G Carey Price, 1D Shea Weber, and 1C Phillip Danault. The step backwards shattered belief and buy-in and the whole thing has made people describe tire fires as “looking like the Montreal Canadiens.”
Quick overview: At the time of Dominique Ducharme’s firing, they’re last in the NHL in goals for per game, scoring 2.2 per, just behind the Coyotes. They’re last in goals against per game by miles (4 per, Columbus is 31st at 3.67 per). That makes a 32nd place goal differential of minus-82, 11 worse than the Coyotes. Finally, they’ve got a winning percentage that’s last at .250, behind their 31st place rival Coyotes (.298 winning percentage).
There’s no doubt LOFT is a massive issue on the Canadiens now, though it shouldn’t change the fact that expectations should be higher than “being the worst team in a league that has the Arizona Coyotes who are actively trying to lose.” This move was unquestionably justified.
So most teams fire a coach and look for the aforementioned “new coach bounce,” but what can the Habs expect from making a coaching change in a season that’s already lost, where winning games has long stopped being their goal?
Of course, another coach of a Canadian team was fired since Ducharme, so let’s look at what the Edmonton Oilers are hoping to accomplish with a coach firing of their own. They’d kill for the type of results that Montreal got last season when they weren’t terrible but made a change anyway.
The difference for this year’s Oilers and last year’s Habs firings, though, is that the Oilers are built the opposite way. They have that coveted top-end talent, but they lack depth. The don’t have an all-world goalie that you can see getting wildly hot at the right moment. Their special teams (well, their power play anyway) is all-world, second-best in the league by the numbers and best over the past couple seasons. Those things make them unique, and should give them hope. So should the fact that they’re a top-10 team in the league by shot attempts, as Montreal was at the time of Julien’s firing.
(There’s also one other tiny little overlap, if we’re being honest: both firings feel more like a GM fighting for his job than identifying a core issue with their teams.)
So let’s get into what the Habs and Oilers should be looking to get from their respective coaching changes, as they’re at vastly different places in their quests to be Stanley Cup competitive.
MONTREAL
One of the first quotes I read from Kent Hughes in his days after taking over as GM was about how the players need to be able to have fun, somehow, even amidst all the flailing. This was from an article by Arpon Basu:
“It’s trying to create an environment where the unwritten rule in hockey — you lose a game, nobody smiles and everybody puts their head down, and even if you happen to be in a particularly good mood, you gave your best effort, you’re not allowed to smile? — that type of environment here, for the rest of the season, is going to be psychologically damaging for players. There has to be a direction from the top, from a leadership perspective. Hey, guys, we expect you to work, we expect you to show up every day, we expect you to do the right things, but we also think it’s OK to have some fun.”
Yesterday after their loss, Marty St. Louis joked, but the joke had a similar underlying message. (His line was about how the guys need to have fun, and likely used to have fun when they were peewees, which makes him the most qualified coach right now. Very clever joke from a guy who comes from coaching his son’s peewee team.)
So what it comes down to for the Habs is this: They aren’t gonna win and, at this point, the outcome of games can’t be the priority. The reality is they’re better off finishing exactly where they are at the end of the season in hopes of grabbing Shane Wright, or whoever they prefer at No. 1 overall.
Because of that reality, the fresh start with the new coach doesn’t have to be how these things usually go: with an immediate desperation to improve, and everyone climbing all over one another for the top opportunities and coach’s favour. St. Louis can slow-play his hand, and get his feet wet while players get to know him.
If you’re looking to see Montreal go in the right direction this season, you’d look for: the development of the young players, who should get opportunity and support. You’d like to see failures met with opportunity to do better, not punishment. You can’t replace experience, even if the experiences aren’t all successes.
You’d like to see no more complete eggs. You’re going to have nights where you’re off, and/or unlucky, and even more of those when you’re under-talented. But you don’t want to see the team roll over and just take their lashings, losing by a touchdown with no pushback. Martin St. Louis won’t accept players going through the motions.
Finally, you’d like to see their on-ice structure start to make some sense. Under-talented teams can keep games close by knowing their respective roles and staying tight, and the Habs have looked lost to me. (My suggestion would be to look at Carolina, who keeps it simple with a straight-up man-on-man defence in their own zone. Montreal doesn’t have the same quality D-men to have their success, but Carolina has the best goals-against-per-game in the NHL. As mentioned Montreal has the worst. If they can start with something simple so everyone is at least on the same page without blown coverages, I gotta believe they’d improve from dead last.)
Now, let’s talk…
EDMONTON
The Oilers need wins, and like, today. They’re currently fifth in the Pacific by points and points percentage, though they do have some games in hand on the Ducks and Kings immediately ahead of them. What they’re looking for is something like Bruce Boudreau gave the Canucks, even a sliver of it.
What Jay Woodcroft is going to get from his players was stuff I mentioned in my article on that Habs team a year ago: tryouts-level effort. Every single player has a fresh chance to prove what they can do to the coach, and for guys who’ve been pencilled into doghouse-lite style roles, it can be invigorating. You know how valuable having invigorated depth can be (in a soft division)? The answer is “very extremely.” What’s also invigorating: every individual will have a meeting with Woodcroft at some point, where they make their case for deserving more. That puts further pressure on guys to prove their worth.
For a while, you get everyone on their best positional behaviour, showing the coach they can be trusted. Part of that comes with small tactical switches a new coach will make — that generally means everyone is mentally engaged on the ice, which can drift during most mid-seasons.
All these things should spark five per cent better versions of the Oilers for a while. This should be all they need to pick up a few more wins, which can make all the difference.
They’re so much easier to judge than Montreal, because they should flat-out win more. If an inspired Oilers team does win a bit, and they make a move or two at the deadline (like say, for a goalie), it’s not hard to see them as a two/three seed in the Pacific, and a legitimate threat to make the Pacific interesting in the first couple rounds. There’s hope there. Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl make it so if everyone else holds up their end of the bargain (goalie included), they can win any game they’re in.
Obviously the goals of the two firings are greatly different, but both seem to have merit for where they’re at in their successful hunts to become Cup contenders. And if it doesn’t happen as drawn up, well, we’ve seen what happens to the coaches of Canadian teams. The pressure is on, and if improvement isn’t evident, it’s not impossible I’m writing this same story in February of 2023.
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