The Montreal Canadiens have made the first coaching change of the season, firing veteran bench boss Claude Julien and replacing him, at least for now, with Dominique Ducharme. Julien was hired by the Canadiens in 2017 after being let go by the Boston Bruins, inking a new expensive five-year deal with Montreal. He didn’t make it through that full contract (it has a year left), but his tenure there wasn’t actually all that unsuccessful. Sure, the Canadiens didn’t make it very deep in the postseason, but they did get there in two of his four chances.
Overall, the Canadiens were 129-113-35 under Julien this time around, but back-to-back losses against the Ottawa Senators eventually sealed his fate. General manager Marc Bergevin told reporters including Arpon Basu of The Athletic today that when the Canadiens had last week off between games, he gave Julien and his staff the benefit of the doubt that he would turn things around. Three straight losses out of the break obviously showed things hadn’t changed, so he made the move to give the younger Ducharme a chance.
The former CHL Coach of the Year has obviously been groomed for this role and will be given the rest of the 2020-21 season to make his case to continue as head coach into the future. Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic reports that Bergevin won’t even be reaching out to other coaching candidates for the time being, giving Ducharme his chance instead. LeBrun also notes that Gerard Gallant, who has been thrown around as a potential replacement in Montreal, would not be willing to take an associate or assistant coach role–he’s waiting for a head coaching position.
Even though Julien’s recent history wasn’t great, it’s important to remember just how successful he’s been as a coach in the NHL. His overall record of 667-445-10-152 gives him a .587 points percentage, meaning his teams average over 96 points a season. He sits 13th on the all-time wins list and lifted the Stanley Cup as head coach of the Bruins in 2011.
Was it the right move for Montreal? Will this be able to turn their season around, given how readily available a playoff spot seems in the North Division? Is Ducharme the right coach to lead them moving forward? Vote on the poll below and make sure you leave your thoughts in the comment section.
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complicated, leaning no. if they hire a Gallant, yeah it was the right move. gotta get the right guy though, but said options are out there.
Next Rangers head coach
I answered complicated solely on the fact that Price is carrying a 10.5 million cap hit with a .893 save percentage. They aren’t a great team, but it’s an awful lot easier to cover up warts when your goalie can make a save.
Playing a good chunk of the year vs Marner/Matthews and McDavid/Draisaitl will do serious damage to a goalies numbers lol
No doubt! honestly how can any goalie in that division post good numbers. I mean koskinen/Smith weren’t going to anyways but now they have an excuse haha
Majority of their games have been against the Canucks and Ottawa. It’s been the Canucks that have been scoring on them the most
6 of their 18 games have still been against Toronto/Edmonton, which is consistent with what the overall total will be. 33% is a heck of a lot of games to have the face the two teams with by far the best offenses in the NHL right now (by 10+ goals over the next closest team).
Um, the reason Edm and tor have good offensive numbers this season is because their whole schedule is against some poor defensive teams, I mean they have been poor defensively for a few years.
I’m just confused because I thought this team was still in rebuild mode. That being said with all the young talent it’s probably for the best to get in a guy who you think can mold them properly.
Gallant is heading to Detroit they want to go the next step in their rebuild he’s the man for them.
Let’s hope
It was the correct move to let him and Muller go. Claude’s problem with Montreal has always been when things go south in a game, he reverts to being ultra conservative, dump and chase mode. This team isn’t built that way and yet they came out guns a blazing, neutral zone speed and chaos to cause turnovers which lead to lots of goals. Then they met a little resistance and the past 6-8 games they’re right back to pure conservative, try not to lose hockey.
Muller’s firing is pretty self-explanatory. Loved the guy as a player and he’s a good associate coach but he’s been in charge of special teams for 2+ years and they’ve looked awful. The PP is ranked 28th since the start of 2018-19 and the PK is 19th. The PK especially as been bad this year as they’re doing this collapsing diamond set up that always leaves a cross ice one timer open.
It kinda depends on who they hire, no?
I would have said no until I heard comments from Suzuki (i.e. playing to not lose and no confidence to take chances) and Weber. The locker room morale is in shambles, and while it might not be juliens fault and he can still be considered a great coach, a shake up was needed.
Unrealistic expectations crept in when the Habs got off to a good start, then began to struggle. This is an odd season with teams stuck in divisional play only which makes overall performances difficult to judge.
Doc Halladay is 100% right