After the Penguins parted company with their AHL coaching staff on Tuesday, perhaps Pens GM Kyle Dubas is reviewing the future of his NHL staff as well.
Up until now, when reviewing the Ottawa Senators' list of possible head coaching candidates, we've all looked at current free agent coaches – Craig Berube, Dean Evason, Todd McLellan and Gerard Gallant - as well as Toronto Marlies head coach John Gruden.
What we haven’t looked at are NHL coaches who are still employed, yet could still be viable candidates by the end of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
One such candidate could be Mike Sullivan of the Pittsburgh Penguins. With the announcement Tuesday that the team’s AHL affiliate in Scranton Wilkes-Barre has parted ways with their coaching staff, one must wonder if a deep dive is being done organizationally to determine next steps.
This might sound far-fetched as the AHL team and NHL teams don't necessarily operate in the same silo. On top of that, Sullivan has a contract extension kicking in next season for three more years.
However, the extension was not signed by new GM Kyle Dubas. With the Penguins missing the playoffs for a second consecutive season, this might give Dubas the excuse he needs to bring in his own guy.
If they went that way, the likelihood that the Penguins would be on the hook for Sullivan's entire $16.5 million is slim. Two-time Stanley Cup champion coaches tend to only be unemployed as long as they want to be.
Like Craig Berube, Dean Evason, and Gerard Gallant, Sullivan enjoyed a lengthy playing career with nearly 750 games in the NHL.
Like Gallant, Sullivan's first head coaching gig (Boston) likely came before he was ready, and it was also wrapped around the 2004-05 lockout season. His team coming out of the lockout might not have been ready for the new rules, or perhaps he wasn’t.
Regardless, he came in with very little coaching experience as an assistant to Robbie Ftorek and had the head coaching job the following season.
After that went south, he then cut his teeth at the AHL level as an assistant coach in the Rangers and Canucks organizations before joining the Penguins as the head coach in Scranton Wilkes-Barre. Even that only lasted 24 games before joining the Penguins as their bench boss and the rest, as they say, is history.
What is interesting about Sullivan’s coaching resume before becoming the head coach with the Penguins is that he did very little in the way of winning. There were no championships or even long playoff runs as a head coach at any level.
Is it possible to overvalue winning at lower levels? Is the AHL as much about developing coaches as it is players?
Though he inherited Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and Marc-Andre Fleury, Sullivan has proven that he can drive a Formula One car to two championships. Though success has been elusive since, two Stanley Cups are hard to overlook. After nine years, his message may finally be getting stale. It happened to Bruce Cassidy in Boston.
Sidney Crosby seemed intent on getting the Penguins to the dance all by himself and if that had happened, it might have bought Sullivan another season. Since they didn’t, he should become a primary target if he hits the open market.
Just the fact that he has managed to keep the job for nine seasons speaks volumes about his longevity. There has been plenty of turnover in that time, yet Sullivan has remained a constant.
He had current Canucks head coach, Rick Tocchet, as an assistant for both of his championship teams and soon to be outgoing Senators interim head coach, Jacques Martin, for one of them.
Martin was on his staff for four of Sullivan’s nine seasons as bench boss and is likely to have input into who his successor will be given that he was hired in a consultant role. Assuming things parted amicably with Martin, it’s hard to imagine that he wouldn’t recommend reaching out if Sullivan becomes available.
Martin might even stay involved with the staff in some capacity if Sullivan’s services were retained. The fact that Martin and Sullivan worked together for that long would suggest that they see things similarly on how to develop a system, playing habits and accountability.
One final consideration would be the playing style that Sullivan would want to implement. The Penguins have had more grit over the years than the Senators currently have. However, they were known more for their skills and creativity. They didn’t wear people down physically yet found a way to win by maximizing their skill players.
This sounds an awful lot more like the template the Senators have in place now. Berube and Evason, in particular, might want to put a style of play in place to suit their coaching style rather than playing to the core players and their strengths. It could become a case of putting a square peg in a round hole.
Again, it’s all predicated on Sullivan becoming available. If he does, there will be other suitors for his services, but the Senators have a situation that a coach like Sullivan might find appealing.