James Guillory-Imagn Images
The NHL’s coaching carousel has already seen the Chicago Blackhawks fire Luke Richardson, the Boston Bruins fire Jim Montgomery and the St. Louis Blues fire Drew Bannister. But there’s no question that other coaches are under the gun.
At least two of them – Predators bench boss Andrew Brunette and Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde – could be the next to go.
The Red Wings have lost five of their last six games. Since Nov. 7, they’re 5-8-3. They’ve posted two measly two-game win streaks since Oct. 24, and since Oct. 28, they’ve gone 5-4-3 in one-goal games. It doesn’t matter whether the Red Wings are playing at home (where they have a 5-7-2 record) or on the road (with a 6-6-2 mark), the Red Wings are subpar regardless of who they’re facing.
The Red Wings dropped back below .500 Saturday night with a performance that led Derek Lalonde to say, “I don’t know if I’ve been in a more frustrating hockey game.”
Here’s more on a night where everything went right for Detroit but the finishing: https://t.co/UiOS68NDr9
— Sam Stockton (@_samstockton) November 10, 2024
Meanwhile, the Predators haven’t won more than one game in a row since a modest three-game win streak in late October. The Predators also have lost seven straight, and since Nov. 3, they’ve gone 3-9-5, pushing them to last place in the league.
Together, the Wings and Predators have been about as disappointing as it gets. Let’s remember that both teams want to make the playoffs, and yet they can’t win games against teams like the Philadelphia Flyers, Montreal Canadiens, Anaheim Ducks and San Jose Sharks.
Sooner or later, Lalonde and Brunette have to be held accountable, and that means they lose their jobs.
Coaches have been fired for far less than Brunette and Lalonde have done (or haven’t done) this season. When you’ve got capable coaching alternatives out there – including Jay Woodcroft, Gerard Gallant, and David Carle – it will be relatively easy for Wings GM Steve Yzerman and Predators GM Barry Trotz to pull the trigger on a coaching change. Perhaps Trotz could even get the coaching bug again and fill in as an interim bench boss so he can get a closer glimpse at what’s happening.
Are we saying that the woes of the Wings and Predators are completely the fault of their coaches? No. But as the old saying goes, you can’t fire all your players, but you can fire your coach. That’s what we’re dealing with regarding Detroit’s struggles and Nasvhville’s major problems.
If Lalonde and Brunette had the answers to what ails their respective teams, we’d already have seen them put out the solutions, and the Wings and Predators would’ve been either near the fringes of the post-season picture or in a playoff position. That hasn’t happened, and instead, Detroit and Nashville have fallen apart game after game. Unless something drastic happens, the Red Wings and Predators will miss the playoffs, and given how both teams were built to win, someone has to pay for it with their jobs.
Their players have put them in the desperate position they’re currently in, but in the zero-sum industry that is the coaching business, the two coaches simply haven’t performed well enough to keep their jobs. The same was true of Bannister in St. Louis, Montgomery in Boston and Richardson in Chicago. And now, barring some miraculous turn of events in Detroit and Nashville, Lalonde and Brunette could suffer the same fate.
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