After the Toronto Maple Leafs decided to move in a direction on the coaching front and let go of Craig Berube on Wednesday, he is technically on the market to join a new team, despite having two more years on his contract.
On Monday morning, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported that the Edmonton Oilers have been granted permission from the Maple Leafs to speak to Berube.
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The Oilers’ head-coaching role is also vacant, as they fired Kris Knoblauch one day after the Leafs fired Berube.
Knoblauch was Edmonton’s bench boss for three seasons, hired in November 2023. He led the Oilers to two straight trips to the Stanley Cup final, but also a first-round exit to the Anaheim Ducks in this past campaign.
As for Berube, he coached the Maple Leafs for two whole seasons.
In his first year, Berube was able to push Toronto to Game 7 of the second round of the playoffs, which is the furthest the Buds have gone in the post-season for quite some time.
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In his second year, the team’s direction started to change course. The Leafs went from 52 wins and Atlantic Division champions in 2024-25, to 32 wins and finishing at the bottom of the division one year later.
Outside of Berube’s contributions in Toronto, he was a Stanley Cup champion in 2019 with the St. Louis Blues, and the following year, they finished first in the Central Division, albeit after playing 71 games due to COVID-19 ending the regular season early.
Maple Leafs Fire Head Coach Craig Berube And What’s Next
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TSN’s Edmonton reporter, Ryan Rishaug, reported that “a formal interview with Berube is expected after some initial conversation” between him and Oilers GM Stan Bowman.
In terms of Leafs GM John Chayka and his search for a new bench boss, on the 32 Thoughts podcast, Friedman name-dropped Jay Woodcroft, David Carle and Manny Malhotra as three candidates that could be in the mix, or had initial conversations.
He further noted that Toronto’s search will be very broad, and that it’s too early to tell what kind of coach will be coming in.
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