Report: Pierre McGuire Fired by Senators
The Ottawa Senators have reportedly fired Pierre McGuire as the team's senior vice president of player development less than a year after his hiring.
The Pierre McGuire Era in Ottawa is apparently over.
According to a report by TSN 1200's AJ Jakubec, the Ottawa Senators have fired Pierre McGuire as the team's senior vice president of player development less than a calendar year after bringing him on board in a shocking move.
This news marks yet another short and unsuccessful stint in an NHL front office for McGuire, who joined the Senators in July of 2021 after a lengthy career as an on-camera analyst for NBC Sports.
At the time of his hiring, the Senators described that McGuire would "work closely with Senators general manager Pierre Dorion and team owner Eugene Melnyk as the team continues to develop into a Stanley Cup contender".
Melnyk's tragic passing earlier this year might have complicated McGuire's role in the organization moving forward, with rumors of friction between himself and Senators' GM Pierre Dorion bubbling under the surface throughout the whole season possibly making the working relationship between the two untenable moving forward.
The lack of on-ice success couldn't have helped, either.
After announcing that the "Rebuild is over" heading into the season, the Senators faltered mightily in 2021-22, finishing second-last in the Atlantic Division above only the league-worst Montreal Canadiens, and falling to 26th in the overall standings.
This is not exactly an unforeseen development for a team employing McGuire in its front office.
After winning a Stanley Cup with the Pittsburgh Penguins as an assistant coach in 1992-93, McGuire proceeded to never hold a role with an NHL organization that finished with a regular-season record above .500 since. His tenure with the Hartford Whalers is the stuff of hockey legend, in fact, with McGuire succeeding Paul Holmgren as the team's head coach midway through the 1993-94 season before his players reportedly demanded him to be let go.
When the Whalers fired McGuire at the end of the season, team captain Pat Verbeek described it at the time as "the best thing that could have happened".