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Columbus Fires Ken Hitchcock
by PuckStopsHere on 02/04/10 at 10:54 AM ET
Comments (2)
The Columbus Blue Jackets announced the firing of coach Ken Hitchcock yesterday. He has been replaced by Claude Noel a longtime minor league hockey coach (with IHL, ECHL and AHL experience) who was a Blue Jackets assistant coach. He is an unknown as an NHL coach.
Ken Hitchcock is one of the most respected NHL coaches. He is 11th in all time regular season coaching wins and has won the Stanley Cup in his Dallas Stars days. He is the most successful coach in Columbus Blue Jackets history - being the only one to guide them to a playoff berth.
Ken Hitchcock teams have always played a very disciplined defensive system and are known for keeping goals against down. This season has been a bit of an anomaly. Columbus is fourth worst in goals against with 3.19 goals allowed per game. This is despite being 14th in the league in shots allowed per game.
The big problem in Columbus is goaltending. Steve Mason was outstanding for a big enough portion of last season to be the rookie of the year and a Vezina Trophy nominee, but he has fallen on hard times. It is not uncommon that goaltenders fall into a “sophomore jinx”. Once they have been around a couple tours of the NHL and have been scouted, team will know their tendencies and have a better chance of scoring on them. Really good goalies manage to change their games and adapt to that situation. The flash in the pan goalies do not adapt and do not last in the NHL. At this point, it is possible that Mason could go down either road, but he has not done well this season. His .890 saves percentage ranks him third worst in the league (with Vesa Toskala and former Blue Jacket Pascal Leclaire below him). There is a huge difference between this season and last year’s .916 saves percentage. That difference is what cost Hitchcock his job.
When you look at the rest of the Columbus team, there isn’t much to impress. Fedor Tyutin, Jan Hejda and Anton Stralman are the top defencemen and none of them are ever thought of as potential all stars. Rick Nash is the scoring star, but he is not a consistent point per game player (his only point per game season was last year - it was 79 points in 78 games). Antoine Vermette, Kristian Huselius and RJ Umberger are the only other players on the roster on pace to clear 40 points. This leaves Columbus with the 20th best offence in the league.
The problem in Columbus is that they have never had a particularly strong team. In order for the team to succeed and make playoffs they need a strong goaltending performance and they have not had one this year. That problem is one of management. Doug MacLean set the team in the wrong direction for many of the years, but Scott Howson took over as GM in 2007 and has had enough time that he should bear responsibility for the lack of depth accumulated under him. The problem in Columbus is management and not coaching. That problem can be masked by good goaltending, as it was last year, but it is the reason that Columbus has never been a legitimate Stanley Cup contender.
Columbus finds themselves without a top coach today. Ken Hitchcock is gone. Unproven Claude Noel comes in. All the same problems of yesterday exist except they have added unproven coaching to their list of problems. The number one coach to hire if a team has an opening is probably Ken Hitchcock. It is a mistake to fire a coach if he becomes the number one available unemployed coach on the market.
The NHL as a whole fires coaches to solve problems that have nothing to do with coaching. At best, this does nothing. At worst, this creates a new problem in the way of coaching. Columbus has taken a step backward by removing a top coach and replacing him with an unknown. The real problem in Columbus is lack of talent and that has to do with management.
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Tags: Claude+Noel, Columbus+Blue+Jackets, Ken+Hitchcock,
Comments
I’m a big Hitch fan. I’m a bigger Jackets Fan. That being said, this is probably the right decision (this coming out after a long night of pondering).
FACT: There is leadership in the locker room from guys who have won cups and/or gold medals (Modin, Commodore, Nash, etc)
FACT: There is a lot of young guys with a great deal of talent (Brassard, Voracek, Mason)
FACT: There are some good things happening with the Jackets (High Power Play efficiency for example)
FACT: Young guys are like Irish Setters who have a lot of untamed energy and want to win badly
FACT: In todays NHL, young guys are the key-Look at what Colorado has done with their young players….
FACT: Hitch does not trust young players. Period. That has always been his criticism.
What I have seen from the youngsters reminds me a lot of the last month of Doug MacLean’s rule over the Jackets. He tried to be the GM and Head Coach. Everyone was playing as though their primary motive was to NOT make a mistake and get a very public verbal beating. They played not so much to win, as to NOT LOSE.
I don’t know if Noel is the answer. He probably isn’t. I am honestly hoping for a coach that doesn’t have a high-profile NHL reputation. I’m looking for a young coach that comes out of the AHL who is used to developing young talent and fostering their growth.
In the end, I’m disappointed that Hitch wasn’t the guy…..but I’m a patient sports fan. I grew up in Cleveland….know what I mean?
Posted by Larry from Columbus, OH on 02/04/10 at 01:59 PM ET
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I wouldn’t qualify Claude Noel as an “unknown” coach. First, he has a name, family, and a career so he is not unknown. Perhaps he’s “unheard” of because he isn’t one of the usual retreads hired as a head coach. Noel has coached in the ECHL, IHL, and AHL for 20 years, so he’s hardly “unknown”. He even won a Calder Cup in Milwaukee a few years ago so this guy must now how to do something right as a coach. For the sake of his career and the future of hockey in Columbus, I hope he follows in the footsteps of Dan Bylsma and Bruce Boudreau as previous “unknowns”.
While I agree with your assessment that Columbus’ defense-first team building, which got them to the playoffs last season, has failed them this season, I don’t think they fall off the radar just because Ken Hitchcock is no longer there. Hitchcock’s loud, challenging style falls on deaf ears after three to four years (partially why he still isn’t with Dallas or Philly). Honestly I’m wondering why the Jackets waited so long to fire him after that awful losing skid last month.
Posted by Todd on 02/04/10 at 01:05 PM ET