Florida Panthers Name Bob Boughner Team's 15th Head Coach

The Florida Panthers on Monday announced that former National Hockey League defenseman, Bob Boughner will become the team’s 15^th head coach in franchise history.

Boughner, 46, served as an assistant coach with the San Jose Sharks under Peter Deboer the past two seasons. Prior to working with the Sharks, he served as an assistant coach on Scott Arniel’s, Columbus Blue Jackets staff. 

During his eight seasons as a bench boss with the Windsor Spitfires of the Ontario Hockey League, he guided the team to the Memorial Cup in 2009 and 2010. The Panthers job will be his first stint at the helm in the NHL. 

In 630 games, over 10 seasons in the league, the defenseman put up 15 goals and 57 assists. Before hanging up his skates in 2006, he laced them up for Buffalo Sabres, Nashville Predators, Pittsburgh Penguins, Calgary Flames, Carolina Hurricanes and Colorado Avalanche. 

Boughner said, “I have always wanted to coach at the end of my career. I worked hard at it and spent a lot of time developing players. I put in my time and I am ready. I learned the craft and I have a lot of knowledge of the league. I am going to make the organization proud and I am going to make the fans proud.” 

He continued, “I have been thinking of this for a long time. I tried to stay patient, put my time in, worked hard at it which I have done. I feel this is the right people and right group to work with, and sometimes that does not always happen. When these jobs come up you have to accept what is there. I feel like I got the best of both worlds.”  

Boughner will replace Tom Rowe at the behind the bench in Sunrise. Rowe was reassigned in the organization on April 10. He had served as the interim coach after the Cats relieved, current Vegas Golden Knights coach, Gerard Gallant of his duties on November 27 in Raleigh, North Carolina. 

The Panthers finished the 2016-2017 season, 35-26-11 and 14 points out of the final Wild Card spot in the Eastern Conference. The season before, they won the Atlantic Division with their best record in franchise history, before falling to the New York Islanders in the second round of the 2016 playoffs. 

General Manager, Dale Tallon pretty much knew that he wanted Boughner as soon as he was finished interviewing him. Tallon mentioned to nhl.com, that Boughner had come into the process with a couple of stacks of files that included analytical as well as details on his philosophy for the team. 

He said, “Bob impressed us like no one else. All the years I have been in the business, Bob was the most prepared. His preparation, his passion, knocked us out of the park.”

Boughner spent three seasons in Pittsburgh, from 1999 to 2001, with current Panthers veteran, Jaromir Jagr. He also has some ties with a couple of other Panthers players. 

His son is friends with defenseman, Aaron Ekblad. He coached forward Derek MacKenzie while his was in Columbus, as well as goaltender, James Reimer in San Jose. He also coached defensemen, Mark Pysyk and Alex Petrovic, in the Under-18 Ivan Hlinka Memorial Cup. 

Boughner added, “I believe in Dale, I believe in this group. I think we have a lot of great pieces to build a winner. I love the lineup. That is the thing that made me the most excited.” 

Boughner also interviewed for the open Sabres job and was a finalist last season for the Colorado Avalanche position, before Jared Bednar won the position, following the resignation of Patrick Roy. 

DeBoer said, “I want to congratulate Bob, as he takes his next step in an already distinguished coaching career, and thank him for the contributions he made to our team and many of our individual players. While we hate to lose him, it is the ultimate compliment to an organization when members of your team are sought out by others.”

 

Tallon had interviewed about 15 candidates for the Panthers open coaching position, while talking to about a handful of others. University of Denver head coach, Jim Montgomery and former Montreal Canadiens bench boss, Michel Therrien were amongst those candidates. 

He added, “I started off with a list. I made a long list of guys from all walks, junior coaches, college colleges, AHL coaches and assistant coaches, and I wanted guys that were probably newer, not necessarily the most experienced. Being a head coach in the NHL was not really the number one criteria for my list that I put together.”

 

Tallon continued, “I wanted new voices, new faces, new attitude, more of a contemporary look. I did not want to go back. There were a lot of good coaches that had NHL coaching experience that I had good conversations with, but they were not exactly what I felt was necessary for us moving forward long-term. That was my plan of attack and I identified a lot of names. Obviously, Bob’s was on the list and then we started paring that down. This was the right choice.”

 

With the hiring of Boughner by the Panthers, only the Sabres do not have a coach in place for the 2017-2018 season. 

Pittsburgh Penguins Win Back to Back Stanley Cups

The Pittsburgh Penguins became the first team to win back-to-back Stanley Cup Championships in 19 years on Sunday night at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tennessee after defeating the Nashville Predators 2-0 in game six. 

In capturing their fifth Stanley Cup in franchise history, the Penguins became the first team to repeat as Stanley Cup Champions, since the Detroit Red Wings accomplished the feat in 1997 against the Philadelphia Flyers and 1998 against the Washington Capitals. 

All five of the Penguins Stanley Cup Championships have been clinched on the road. 

As a matter of fact, the last time any team from Pittsburgh clinched a World Championship on home field, was on October 13, 1960, when Bill Mazeroski hit a 406-foot home run in the bottom of the ninth at Forbes Field, giving the Pittsburgh Pirates a World Series victory over the New York Yankees. 

Since then the Pirates won the World Series in Baltimore in 1971 and 1979, the Pittsburgh Steelers won their six Super Bowls all in neutral sites and the Penguins won their Stanley Cups in Bloomington, Minnesota (1991) Chicago, Illinois (1992), Detroit, Michigan (2009), San Jose, California (2016) and Nashville (2017). 

Game six was a tight battle all night long. After a scoreless first period, the Predators thought they had opened the scoring just over a minute into the middle frame, as Colton Sissons appeared to put the puck in the net. The ref blew the whistle though before the puck crossed the goal line, after losing sight of it and disallowing the goal. 

Both goaltenders kept the puck out of the net through the second period and a majority of the final period, before Patric Hornqvist was able to put a rebound, off the back off Predators’ netminder Pekka Rinne, into the back of the net with 1:32 left in regulation to give the Penguins a 1-0 lead. 

Nashville challenge the goal for goaltender interference, but was unsuccessful in their challenge. 

Carl Hagelin would add an empty-net goal with 13.2 seconds left in the game, to ice the victory for the Penguins. Goaltender Matt Murray managed to turn away all 27 shots he faced to put up his second straight shutout of the series. 

Penguins’ captain, Sidney Crosby won his second straight Conn Smythe Trophy as Most Valuable Player of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, becoming just the third player in NHL history to do so, joining Bernie Parent of the Philadelphia Flyers (1974 & 1975) and Mario Lemeiux of the Penguins (1991 & 1992).

In regard to being able to become the first team to repeat as champions in almost 20 years, Crosby told NBC Sports, “That was our goal from the start of the year, we knew it had not been done in a long time. To be able to accomplish it is a great feeling.”

Crosby finished second, behind teammate Evgeni Malkin, in scoring throughout the postseason as he put up eight goals and 19 assists in 24 games. 

He added, “We knew it was going to be tough all year. We just tried to keep with it. We had a lot of injuries and things like that, so we just kept finding ways. That was really what we did all season, and all playoffs, and it was great to be able to do it.”

 

In winning their fifth Stanley Cup, the Penguins became just the seventh team in NHL history at least five. The Montreal Canadiens lead the way with 24, followed by the Toronto Maple Leafs (13), Red Wings (11), Boston Bruins (6), Chicago Blackhawks (6) and Edmonton Oilers (5) are the other six. 

The Oilers and Penguins are the only two non “Original Six” teams to have five or more championships. Prior to the Red Wings being the last repeat champions, the Penguins repeat in 1991 and 1992. 

The Canadiens lead the way with the most repeat championships at 10, their most recent being four in a row from 1976-1979. The Maple Leafs have four, Red Wings (3), and the Oilers have two like the Penguins. 

The Flyers (1974 & 1975) and the New York Islanders (1980, 1981, 1982 & 1983) have also won the Stanley Cup in back-to-back years. 

Penguins’ head coach, Mike Sullivan became the first American born coach to win multiple and back-to-back Stanley Cup Championships.  

Philadelphia Flyers Extend Shayne Gostisbehere to Six Year 27 Million Dollar Extension

The Philadelphia Flyers announced on Friday that they reached a six-year, 27 million-dollar, agreement with defenseman, Shayne Gostisbehere. 

The 24-year-old blueliner could have become a restricted free agent on July 1, had the two sides not hammered out an extension. In 76 games during the past season, he put up seven goals and 32 assists, and was a minus-21, for the Flyers. 

During his rookie season, in 2015-2016, he finished second in voting for the Calder Trophy behind Chicago Blackhawk forward, Artemi Panarin. 

Gostisbehere told the Flyers website, “It is a dream come true to be a part of one of the best organizations in hockey. With everything that is going on here. We have got some young guys coming up and we already have some key pieces. It is nice to know you are part of the future and part of the plans. There are many more steps to come and hopefully it leads to some great things. It is a tremendous honor to realize you are a part of the future.”  

While he was frequently scratched by Flyers head coach, Dave Hakstol, throughout his sophomore season, general manager, Ron Hextall, supported his coach’s decision and did not feel it hurt Gostisbehere’s development. 

Hextall said, “Shayne and I will throw [Flyers forward] Travis Konecny, in there as well, there are lessons to learn when you are a young player. Sometimes at the time you do not understand them, but I assure you that this year, next year, the year after Shayne will look back at those experiences and go, `I learned a lot from that.’”

He continued, “A lot comes at a young player, a lot of young players are handed unlimited ice time, unlimited roles because all the way up they are the best player on their team and there are lessons that a lot of them have to go through as pros and Ghost went through some of those last year and he is clearly going to be a better player because of it.”

Gostisbehere was selected by the Flyers in the third round of the 2012 National Hockey League Entry Draft, with the 78^th overall selection. 

Philadelphia is expected to protect Gostisbehere in the 2017 NHL Expansion Draft. The Flyers along with the 29 other teams must submit their lists of protected players, that the Vegas Golden Knights can’t choose, by 5:00 PM on June 17.