The Geese announced Saturday they’ve relieved head coach Greg Cronin of his duties. He had one season remaining on his contract, per Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic.
Normal supervisor Pat Verbeek launched an announcement on his determination:
“I wish to personally thank Greg for his tireless work and dedication to the crew. He’s accountable in some ways for the advance we’ve seen from our younger core. Nevertheless, after a number of weeks of cautious analysis, I concluded we would have liked a change in course and a brand new voice. This was an especially tough determination for me to make, however I felt it was essential to proceed our progress towards changing into a Stanley Cup contender that I do know we may be.”
Cronin spent the final two seasons behind the bench in Anaheim, his first stint as an NHL bench boss. It was hardly his first time operating a crew, nonetheless, because the 61-year-old had head teaching expertise on the NCAA stage with Northeastern College and the AHL stage with Colorado the place he spent 5 seasons earlier than the Geese employed him in June 2023. He additionally had earlier expertise on an NHL bench as an assistant with the Islanders and Maple Leafs.
His first season was significantly tough. Anaheim managed a report of simply 27-50-5 whereas being within the bottom-three in targets scored whereas permitting the Thirtieth-most targets within the NHL. Past a profession 12 months from Frank Vatrano, lots of their key gamers both underachieved or didn’t develop as deliberate, resulting in some hypothesis that Anaheim may make a change after only one season.
That didn’t occur and issues did go higher for the Geese this 12 months. They added 21 factors in comparison with the earlier season, placing them sixth within the Pacific Division. Issues improved on the goals-allowed facet as they had been twenty second in that regard this 12 months, however as soon as once more, aim manufacturing was onerous to return by as they as soon as once more ranked Thirtieth general though they did add 14 tallies in comparison with 2023-24. Key younger forwards like Mason McTavish and Leo Carlsson took steps ahead in comparison with their manufacturing a 12 months in the past, whereas Cutter Gauthier completed robust. In the meantime, Jackson LaCombe grew to become a top-pairing blueliner, so there have been actually extra positives from a improvement perspective, however that wasn’t sufficient for Verbeek to retain Cronin.
Whereas Verbeek references persevering with progress towards being a Cup contender, there’s a great distance nonetheless to go for them to get there. With that in thoughts, it is going to be fascinating to see if he opts for an additional much less skilled coach with an emphasis on participant improvement or if he’ll look to extra of a veteran possibility with an eye fixed on attempting to get again into the playoff image shortly. Anaheim turns into the primary true head coach opening across the NHL, though different groups will likely be conducting searches to see if there’s a higher match behind the bench than the interim head coaches that completed the 12 months in these roles.
