Even after Cam Neely fired a rather ominous shot across the bow when it came to Bruce Cassidy’s status last month, the B’s bench boss wasn’t exactly looking over his shoulder ahead of a potentially seismic summer of change for his roster.
After all, Cassidy had been given indication that his position and his job security were “status quo” going into the final year of his contract in 2022-23 — even getting the green light to go ahead and inform assistant coach Kevin Dean that he was not expected back this upcoming year.
Add in his impressive track record of getting strong returns from a roster hampered by a lack of a supporting cast and a weak influx of young talent, and Cassidy was the first of many who were surprised when Don Sweeney informed him that the B’s were moving in a different direction.
“At the end of the day, you’re always on the clock as a coach, it did catch me a bit by surprise when he came over,” Cassidy said in a Zoom interview with Bruins media on Thursday. “He explained his process. I respect what he has to do as a general manager. He’s in charge of the head coach. So that’s how it ended.
“Don was very respectful in how he delivered the message. I don’t always agree with it. Obviously, I want to be the coach of the Boston Bruins. But again, here we are.”
So what exactly was it — besides an ill-advised attempt to place blame on a coach for a front office’s shortcomings — that prompted Sweeney and the B’s to cut Cassidy loose?
For Cassidy, the primary message was what has been echoed quite a bit already from Sweeney and even Neely last month — an inability for Cassidy to get his message across, and put younger players in the best position to succeed.
Cassidy, as expected, disagreed with such sentiment.
"What Donny indicated to me was that the messaging was not being received, or being delivered the wrong way,” Cassidy said. “I think as coaches, you have to evolve over the years. Players change. But at the end of the day, to be perfectly frank, I’m very proud of the work I’ve done. … I thought the messaging for us was good.
“We were successful. We played the right way we played to our identity, do we have lapses? Of course. Do we need to fix some things? Of course. All those things. But I think it shows in our record that the players received the message. Now there are individuals that you have to work harder with.”
And when it comes to particular individuals, it sure seems like the primary bump in the road lies in Boston’s younger crop of talent.
For as much as the narrative was entertained on Monday night that Cassidy’s dismissal was a byproduct of a vote of no confidence from Boston’s veteran leadership, both Cassidy and even Patrice Bergeron himself pushed back on such a notion — with Cassidy noting that he often deferred to his franchise cornerstones when it came to policing the room.
"I went to our leadership group a lot,” Cassidy said. “‘What's going on? Hey, this player here — I don't think he's receiving your delivery as well as the player beside them.' And then you bring the player in, we talk and that becomes a little more of a than a personal back and forth, as opposed to less direct on the bench of ‘Hey, that's what we need' and move on. And that's what I wanted out of those guys. You want to correct and get to the perfect way to communicate to players as quickly as possible. And that's easier said than done.”
Of course, one can look at the lack of contributions from the B’s next wave of talent in 2021-22 and see why Cassidy’s short leash on youngsters like Jack Studnicka or Trent Frederic might draw the ire of someone like Neely.
For as much as successful franchises are anchored by proven, established stars, you also desperately need younger contributors that can support that established core (without putting you in a cap crunch thanks to entry-level deals).
And be it Studnicka (three assists over 15 games) or Frederic (a career-high 18 points, but also a spot up on the ninth floor during Boston’s first-round exit against Carolina), the Bruins didn’t get nearly enough from their younger talent.
“There's no question players are afraid to make mistakes, especially younger players, because, you know, you hear about it," Neely said last week. "And I was one of those players that, you know, I had to learn and grow. And I heard about it, too. And I made mistakes as a younger player. But you can't worry about not getting back out there. I think that's one of the things we have to kind of change. I think when younger players make mistakes, they're worried they're not going to play the next game while that game is still going on.”
Yes, Cassidy is far from a perfect coach. And yes, perhaps he should have given some players a longer leash to learn, fail and potentially thrive at hockey’s highest level.
But for as much as Neely noted that he was also a player that needed more time to develop, I don’t think that skaters like Studnicka and Frederic are necessarily on that same tier of player.
And, in the bigger picture, the B’s inability to really usher in an effective youth movement should fall more on Sweeney and Neely than Cassidy.
After all, it wasn’t like the Bruins were necessarily facilitating a deluge of blue-chip prospects into the system, not when this franchise was focused on contending and relinquishing draft capital in an effort to make the most out of the Bergeron/Krejci contention window.
This isn’t a case of “what about-ism”, either. Even in deals such as the Rick Nash swap (in which Boston gave up Ryan Lindgren and a first-round pick that New York used to draft K’Andre Miller), Sweeney was justified in trying to acquire a legit top-six winger, one who the Bruins envisioned was going to be planted on Krejci’s line far beyond 2018 (until concussion issues arose for Nash).
Some of that dearth of proven young talent is simply the cost of doing business.
“I think what happens is when you're a team that's contending for the Stanley Cup, there's just not as much room on the roster to put those guys in on a regular basis,” Cassidy said. “We want guys to learn from their mistakes, it's going to happen, no one is perfect. And we're okay with that. But at the end of the day, when you're vying for a championship, the closer you get to that, any player, young or old, has to make sure that their game is buttoned up. And that's our job as a staff to make them better.
“I think I can't say enough about Pando, Joe Sacco, Kevin, now Chris Kelly. They poured their hearts and soul into making these guys better. And I hope at some point they appreciate that down the road — that (we) cared about the player, cared about them as a person."
But what can’t be absolved when it comes to Boston’s inability to incorporate young talent is the B’s multiple whiffs when they WERE on the clock during previous drafts. We all know about 2015 at this point, but fiascos in 2016 (Frederic over Alex DeBrincat) and 2017 (Urho Vaakanainen over Josh Norris and Robert Thomas) also loom large.
And it’s also not like Cassidy has never embraced an organizational shift centered on adding young talent.
Look no further than the 2017-18 season, in which Cassidy was at the helm in a year where Boston rolled with 21-year-old Anders Bjork on the top line, 21-year-old Jake DeBrusk on the second line, 20-year-old Charlie McAvoy in a top-pair spot, 22-year-old Danton Heinen in the middle-six and 21-year-old Brandon Carlo entrenched on the blue line.
Add in the addition of Ryan Donato later in the spring, 25-year-old Sean Kuraly’s growing role on the fourth line and Matt Grzelcyk’s eventual promotion from Providence, and the B’s made some significant strides with Cassidy calling the shots.
“When I came on board, we changed a lot of players and we infused our team with a lot of young talent,” Cassidy said. “Jake DeBrusk, Anders Bjork, Danton Heinen, Pasta was still young there. Grzelcyk, Carlo, McAvoy and I think a lot of those guys have gone ahead and had real nice careers. Some of them have left here obviously for different reasons.”
It’d also be one thing if some of the younger players that left Boston via trade or other circumstances thrived after leaving Cassidy and the B’s. But let’s run through some of the list:
- Anders Bjork: After getting dealt in the Taylor Hall swap, Bjork has just eight goals and 14 points in 73 games with Buffalo.
- Ryan Donato: Had a solid season (16 goals) for cellar-dwelling Seattle in 2021-22, but bounced around with both Minnesota and San Jose before earning a longer look with the Kraken.
- Peter Cehlarik: A younger player who has been vocal about his displeasure with Cassidy, Cehlarik has spent the last two seasons overseas in Europe.
- Zach Senyshyn: Upon arriving in Ottawa for the rebuilding Sens, Senyshyn logged just two games with his hometown club, averaging 6:32 of ice time per game. Yikes.
- Karson Kuhlman: Eight points in 25 games with Seattle after getting plucked off waivers.
- Jakob Forsbacka Karlsson: After logging just 29 games with the Bruins from 2017-19, Forsbacka Karlsson spent two seasons back in his native Sweden and did not play pro hockey this past year.
You could chalk up Frank Vatrano as the outlier here (139 points in 293 games with Florida/New York), while Danton Heinen (who had the highest point total of his career under Cassidy) had a strong 2021-22 campaign with Pittsburgh.
However, it should be noted that Heinen was dealt by Boston in order to fulfill management’s need for more size in the middle-six group, a move that resulted in the arrival of Nick Ritchie — who was then not qualified by the B’s less than two years later.
Listen, if Cassidy was allowed to coach this club in 2022-23, and he ended up stapling a young skater like Fabian Lysell to the bench for a failed clear or a D-zone lapse? Then there would be a major issue.
But at this point, taking Cassidy to task for his failure to develop NHL prospects who… may not be everyday NHL players ... is a bit of a stretch.
And don’t forget, even if players like Stundnicka and Frederic weren’t given a fair shake — maybe Sweeney shouldn’t have gone out and allocated a hefty chunk of change on veterans like Erik Haula, Nick Foligno, Tomas Nosek and others who shored up roster spots before camp even opened.
“We're trying to always improve the team and then on to now more recently — Trent Frederic, we've tried to incorporate in the lineup on a regular basis, Jack Studnicka is knocking on the door," Cassidy said. "Unfortunately had a few veteran guys in front of him. And we'll see how that plays out down the road for the next coach and how much availability there is on the roster for him.
“But Zboril was turning the corner, Jeremy Lauzon, I thought did really good work for us. Unfortunately had to expose him. That's just part of the business. You're seeing Swayman develop. So like I said, I'm very proud of my record with young guys. … Not every player is going to work out, not every player you're going to connect with, young or old. But I believe in myself when it comes to coaching young guys.”
Cassidy certainly isn’t immune to any criticism at all. But Boston’s underwhelming returns when it comes to cultivating future talent should not fall on a coach — not after assessing the state of this franchise’s prospect pool.
“No coach in the league buys the groceries, right? So that's understood,” Cassidy said. “That's why I think it's important that the person hiring you, your beliefs are aligned in how you want to play. And I felt Donnie and I were. We wanted to be hard to play against. The identity of this team, the Bruins for years, has been ‘Hey, they're going to work hard, they're going to be together, and they're going to keep the puck out of their net.’
“We've had years where the offense has been there more than others over the course of time. So there was no issue there. You can always make adjustments. And if you don't, you're gonna fall behind. I think we have made some adjustments over the years without getting away from what we did. And that's where it becomes personnel driven.”