After nearly nine years on the job, Brad Treliving departs from the post
The first move of the Calgary Flames summer started near the top.
With general manager Brad Treliving and the Calgary Flames agreeing to part ways — his contract was due to expire June 30 — the Flames have kicked off a summer of potential change. Or at least the beginning of changes.
Don Maloney, who joined the team in 2016 as a pro scout and served as senior vice president of hockey operations for the past five seasons, has been named president of hockey operations and interim GM.
“Really, I thought for sure Brad would re-sign. And I’m as close to him as anybody. Up until he told me Wednesday he couldn’t do it, that was the first time that reality was he needed to take some time,” an emotional Maloney told the assembled media in Calgary.
Treliving, who was offered a contract extension last fall and during the season, informed the team last Wednesday, the day of Calgary's final regular-season contest.
An obvious candidate to replace Treliving is Craig Conroy, who has served as assistant GM for the past nine years.
The move comes as no surprise. The Flames missed the Stanley Cup playoffs with a 37-28-17 record, which continued a crazy run of inconsistency from season to season.
Twice under Treliving’s time, they won division titles, including the 2019 Western Conference regular-season crown, but also missed the playoffs four times. Calgary won two playoff series, plus the qualifying round in 2020.
Last summer was a turning point for the club, with Johnny Gaudreau parting via free-agency and Matthew Tkachuk forcing a trade to the Florida Panthers. The biggest replacements brought in, Jonathan Huberdeau and Nazem Kadri both fell short of expectations.
While those moves did not pan out, Treliving certainly had a huge hand in improving the club’s success at the draft, made some astute moves re-signing players and via trades and added a handful of successful free-agents in the likes of goaltender Jacob Markstrom and Chris Tanev
What happens next for the Flames will certainly be must-watch activity. Coach Darryl Sutter has a two-year contract extension that kicks in for next season, and the Flames have a list of key players due to become unrestricted free agents after the 2023-24 season, among them Elias Lindholm, Mikael Backlund, Tyler Toffoli, Noah Hanifin, Chris Tanev and Nikita Zadorov.
Eventually, the Flames will need a legitimate rebuild, but it does not appear in the cards to be the plan yet.
"You don’t want to under-react but you don’t want to over-react," team president and CEO John Bean said. "You know what we have? We have a Vezina-nominated goalie. I would keep him next year and I can’t wait to see Jacob (Markstrom) come back and play next year. We have a really strong defense. … We’ve got a great lineup that under-performed, so before we start— you used the word, not me, I’m not allowed ever to use the word rebuild — we’re not going to over-react here.”