{"id":469814,"date":"2025-06-04T15:07:17","date_gmt":"2025-06-04T19:07:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=469814"},"modified":"2025-06-04T15:07:17","modified_gmt":"2025-06-04T19:07:17","slug":"pittsburgh-penguins-dan-muse-hired","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/06\/04\/pittsburgh-penguins-dan-muse-hired\/","title":{"rendered":"Pittsburgh Penguins Select New Head Coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/05\/23\/penguins-goaltending\/\" target=\"_self\">Pittsburgh Penguins<\/a> have made their choice for the team&#8217;s new head coach. <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.nhl.com\/penguins\/news\/pittsburgh-penguins-name-dan-muse-the-26th-head-coach-in-franchise-history\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">News emerged<\/a> on Wednesday afternoon that Dan Muse has been hired the team&#8217;s next head coach. Muse is the 23rd head coach in franchise history and <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/04\/28\/pittsburgh-penguins-and-mike-sullivan-agree-to-part-ways\/\" target=\"_self\">he&#8217;ll replace<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/s\/sullimi01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-04_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mike Sullivan<\/a> behind the bench.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"bluesky-embed\" data-bluesky-uri=\"at:\/\/did:plc:b2kutgxqlltwc6lhs724cfwr\/app.bsky.feed.post\/3lqsarwm4i22e\" data-bluesky-cid=\"bafyreid7osninqkdkt45fqox23leycbninuxcxarlbmtuzgxmvfysuabge\">\n<p lang=\"en\">NEWS: The Penguins have hired Rangers assistant coach Dan Muse as their next head coach, the team announced Wednesday.Details and analysis: www.nytimes.com\/athletic\/640&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; <a  href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/did:plc:b2kutgxqlltwc6lhs724cfwr?ref_src=embed\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Athletic (@theathletic.bsky.social)<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/did:plc:b2kutgxqlltwc6lhs724cfwr\/post\/3lqsarwm4i22e?ref_src=embed\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">2025-06-04T16:42:46.002Z<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/embed.bsky.app\/static\/embed.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Dan Muse Hired as Pittsburgh Penguins Head Coach<\/h2>\n<p>Muse has been an assistant with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/05\/29\/nhl-rumours-projected-contract-for-new-york-rangers-rfa-forward\/\" target=\"_self\">New York Rangers<\/a> and the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/05\/30\/nhl-rumours-nashville-predators-forward-possible-trade-bait\/\" target=\"_self\">Nashville Predators.<\/a> The 42-year-old coach was most-recently with the Blueshirts from 2023-25 under <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/l\/laviope01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-04_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Peter Laviolette<\/a>. He was an assistant in Nashville from 2017-20.<\/p>\n<p>The Canton, Mass. native helped guide his teams to three divisional titles during his stints as an assistant. Muse helped run the penalty-killing units with both the Predators and the Rangers. Both teams had strong PK units while he was helming them.<\/p>\n<p>He&#8217;s also won titles at the NCAA, USHL, and IIHF U18 and U20 levels. Muse helped Yale win the NCAA Division I title in 2013. He&#8217;s served with USA Hockey and helped <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/m\/mcgroru01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-04_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rutger McGroarty<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/l\/leonary01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-04_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ryan Leonard<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/s\/smithwi01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-04_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Will Smith<\/a>,\u00a0 Zeev Buium and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/h\/hughelu01.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-06-04_hr\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Luke Hughes<\/a> during their development stages.<\/p>\n<h3>What It Means<\/h3>\n<p>Penguins General Manager has decided to give someone without NHL experience a shot. <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2025\/05\/01\/nhl-rumours-pittsburgh-penguins-coaching-search\/\" target=\"_self\">A number of names<\/a> like Mitch Love and others had appeared in coaching searches. However, Dubas has decided to go with Muse.<\/p>\n<p>Pittsburgh&#8217;s special teams have struggled in recent seasons and Muse might be able to help the penalty-killing unit. The Penguins were 18th in the league when it comes to killing off penalties.<\/p>\n<p>He also has experience in developing young talent, as he was with the United States National Team Development Program from 2020-23. Pittsburgh may have an influx of young players through stockpiling assets. Muse may be able to help develop these younger players.<\/p>\n<p>Dubas is putting his faith in a coach that&#8217;s not been a bench boss at the NHL level. However, it could be a chance for the Penguins to finally move forward.<\/p>\n<p><em>Main photo by: Christopher Hanewinckel-Imagn Images<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Penguins have made their choice for the team&#8217;s new head coach. News emerged on Wednesday afternoon that Dan Muse has been hired the team&#8217;s next head coach. Muse is the 23rd head coach in franchise history and he&#8217;ll replace Mike Sullivan behind the bench. NEWS: The Penguins have hired Rangers assistant coach Dan [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2352,"featured_media":469815,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[8163,1696,1020,6022],"class_list":["post-469814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dan-muse","tag-kyle-dubas","tag-mike-sullivan","tag-pittsburgh-penguins-news"],"modified_by":"Dan Mount, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2352"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=469814"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":469816,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469814\/revisions\/469816"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/469815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=469814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=469814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=469814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}