Senators fire Paul MacLean; Dave Cameron named head coach
The Ottawa Senators have dismissed head coach Paul MacLean, the club announced Monday.
MacLean, 56, has been the Senators head coach since the 2012 season and won a Jack Adams award for Coach of the Year in his first season with the club. He racked up a 114-90-35 record behind the Senators bench in three seasons.
The move comes as something of surprise, since it follows a Senators victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Sunday night.
Renaud Lavoie of TVA suggests that this move has been in the works for a while:
Senators management had strong discussions about making a change behind the bench after last season. Its now a done deal.
— Renaud Lavoie (@renlavoietva) December 8, 2014
From GM Bryan Murray on the next head coach.
"Dave Cameron will be the head coach, not interim, he will be the head coach going forward. I met with Dave after I met with Paul this morning, to ask his interest, talk at length about the type of belief he had with the team.... Mind you I've talked to the coaches as a group at the end of last year, start of this year, and Dave was included in that, I liked what he said about our team, what he believed about our team, how he believed in some of the youngest players on our team."
A former Detroit Red Wings assistant, MacLean was known for coaching an uptempo style of hockey that eschewed shot-blocking to a nearly unprecedented degree. He was also known for his "aw shucks" demeanor, and would frequently refer to himself in self-deprecating fashion as a "simple fisherman from Nova Scotia."
MacLean's style obviously wore out its welcome in Ottawa, but hockey fans in general will miss his showy mustache and the amusing mental games he played with opponents and the press.
From walking out on a press conference following a playoff loss in 2013, to torturing the Montreal Canadiens to the point that Brandon Prust referred to him as a "fat bug-eyed walrus," MacLean was an unforgettable character, even if the Senators decided on Monday that he's not the man to guide the club going forward.