Hanlon Fired
Coach Glen Hanlon was fired this morning with the Caps off to the franchise's worst start in 26 years and mired in last place in NHL with 13 points in 21 games.
The final straw, it seems, was last night's wretched 5-1 loss to Atlanta at Verizon Center, where the Thrashers scored five consecutive goals and the Caps appeared incapable of doing anything about it. The defeat was Washington's fifth straight and ninth in 10 games.
Hershey Coach Bruce Boudreau will replace Hanlon on an interim basis.
Boudreau, who coached seven of the current Capitals when they were members of the Bears, is on the ice at Kettler Capitals Iceplex, presiding over his first practice. He'll make his NHL debut tomorrow afternoon in Philadelphia against the Flyers at Wachovia Center.
No timetable has been set for naming a coach beyond Boudreau's interim status.
The 52-year-old Toronto native led the Bears to back-to-back championship round appearances in the American Hockey League, winning the Calder Cup in 2005-06. He coached nine seasons in the AHL and played parts of eight seasons with the Maple Leafs and Blackhawks, recording 70 points in 141 games as a forward.
Hanlon, meantime, leaves with a record of 78-123-9-29. His assistant coaches, Jay Leach and Dean Evason, have been retained, according to the team.
The players found out about the change this morning. But anyone who attended Hanlon's postgame press conference last night knew something was coming down.
Update:Boudreau has only been on the ice for about 40 minutes, but I can already point out some major differences in how he deals with players. First of all, he's a yeller. He's barks encouragement and instructions constantly during drills -- something you rarely heard from Hanlon, who was more reserved on the ice.
The players also have to race over to the eraser board when Boudreau blows his whistle. The last player to the huddle is forced to skate a lap. Just saw Erskine do one.
Update:Here are some quotes for you to digest before digging into that turkey:
Ovechkin: "Of course I am surprised. I really like him, he give me a lot. It's hard for him, hard for the team. It's life. I've never been in this situation in my life, with coach getting fired. If team lose, guy who will be fired is coach. If we win, nobody talking about coach. If we lose, everyone talks about coach."
Of Boudreau, Ovechkin said: "He's more offensive coach. He tell us shoot the puck more, move quickly."
Clark: "I'm disappointed, I take a lot of the responsibility on myself as one of the older guys on the team to come through for a great guy like Glennie. I'm taking this really hard."
As for Boudreau's style: "Everything is to try to force the other team to make a mistake. You don't give them time, the liberty of skating with the puck. You want to make them make a bad pass."
Kolzig: "I left Glen a message and told him I was sorry, sorry that we weren't successful. Everyone's got to look themselves in the mirror and get it done.
"We had a meeting about all the mistakes we made against Florida the other day. It was pretty evident what we were doing wrong, and we went right back out in the second period yesterday and did the exactly the same thing."
Update: Here's Boudreau's first shot at the forward line combos:
Ovechkin-Kozlov-Clark
Fleischmann-Nylander-Semin
Pettinger-Steckel-Gordon
Brashear-Laich/Backstrom-Bradley
The key here, obviously, is that Backstrom is sharing time on the fourth line.
The 'D' pairings have been changing from drill to drill, so it's tough to say right now.
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/capitals ... fired.html
