The Ottawa Senators have had a tough time maintaining a bench boss in the last decade. Since the Sens went all the way to the Stanley Cup Final in 2007, they have had 6 different head coaches. On May 8th 2016, Guy Boucher was announced as the next man in charge. It’s his first season with the Sens, and tonight will mark the 41st game as the official halfway point, so let’s take a look at Boucher so far.
Mid-Season Report On Guy Boucher
Boucher has had a very interesting path that has led to his newest job. He has coached in various leagues including the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL), the American Hockey League, the NHL, Swiss League and now back to the NHL. In those leagues he has experienced multiple levels of success. In 2008/2009, coaching the Drummondville Voltigeurs, his team finished 1st overall in the regular season and went on to win the President’s Cup. In his only year as an AHL coach, he was honoured with the A.R Pieri memorial award for coach of the year.
Path to His Current Position
He went on to coach the Tampa Bay Lightning from 2010-2013, which included a trip to Game 7 of the Conference Finals. After a few years in the Swiss league with SC Bern, he decided he was ready for another NHL job, and rumour has it he was very close to landing a job with the Toronto Maple Leafs before Mike Babcock accepted. Runner-up to Babcock is not so bad. Then, new Senators GM Pierre Dorion claimed Boucher as his first choice and handed him the reigns for this season. So that’s how he got here, but what has he brought to the Sens?
Intelligence, detail oriented, and a power play specialist are some of the qualities used when describing Boucher. Some have claimed he coaches players too much and focuses on his systems far too heavily. In today’s NHL though, being an ultimate strategist will get you nowhere if the players don’t buy into the system. Tampa Bay Lightning center Steven Stamkos was asked about Boucher and touted him as “smart and very prepared.”
“For games and practices, he has a plan and there’s definitely not a time where we went into a game or practice not knowing what’s going on. He’s always making sure that he’s prepared and the coaching staff is prepared.”
He also explained that Boucher took time to genuinely get to know his players. In fact he even went to visit Dion Phaneuf in P.E.I this summer before the season to chat with him. He wants to know what makes a player tick. He tries to figure out how can he get the most out of that player, based on what kind of person they are, not solely on what kind of hockey player they are. That’s how he gets players to buy into his system.
Senators, With Subtle Differences, Better
Boucher spends a lot of time focusing on the power play unit for the Sens. Last season the Sens were 26th in the league power play with 15.8% success rate. This season they have bumped that up to 17.2%, which is not amazing but that also puts them tied for 18th in the league in power play success, so that’s an improvement. Another area that needed improvement was the amount of shots Ottawa was allowing per game. Last season the Sens were the league’s worst in shots against, averaging 32.8 a game. This year, the Sens are allowing a rate of 30.3 per game, which puts them at 16th in the league. Moving 14 spots up in the first 41 contests? Steep improvement. They also stand at 14th-best in allowing overall shot attempts, 15 spots better than where they finished last season.
Mike Condon has been able to step into a starting role and has been a pleasant surprise with the numbers he has been putting up in Craig Anderson‘s absence. Less shots per game has turned into less goals against per game. Last year, the team was 26th, allowing 2.94 goals per game, this year that number has been cut down to 2.59, good for 11th in the league. The goal every year is to make the playoffs, and with the changes, Boucher has his team tied with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Florida Panthers for the third spot in the Atlantic Division at the midway mark.
It will be interesting to see what happens the rest of the way with Boucher’s handling of the Ottawa Senators. Anderson may return at any time, Clarke MacArthur is rumoured to be close to returning, prospect Colin White may get a place on the team when he is finished with Boston College and maybe the team will even add pieces near the trade deadline.
So far it’s fair to say he has done a good job with the team he has been given.
Quote courtesy of Ottawa Sun.
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