The St. Louis Blues have fired second-year head coach Drew Bannister and changed him with recently-fired Boston Bruins coach Jim Montgomery. The transfer was first reported by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman.
It’s a surprising teaching change. St. Louis has struggled this season, posting a 9-12-1 file and a 3-6-1 file in what is going to now be Bannister’s final 10 video games with the membership. The poor showings have the Blues ranked sixth within the Central Division – however their poor begin hasn’t come as an excessive amount of of a shock, particularly as St. Louis offers with accidents to Torey Krug, Nick Leddy and Philip Broberg.
However St. Louis has deemed the dropping an excessive amount of, and now separate from Bannister earlier than he may coach a full 82 video games. The 50-year-old took over the Blues’ head teaching position from Craig Berube final December, incomes a promotion after three years main the AHL’s Springfield Thunderbirds. Bannister was shortly productive in Springfield, main the group to a 43-24-9 file and journey to the Calder Cup Finals in his inaugural season of 2021-22, although the T-Birds would fall to the oft-champions Hershey Bears. Bannister adopted the lengthy playoff run up with a 38-26-8 file and qualifying-round exit within the following yr, however appeared to have the wind behind him to begin the 2023-24 marketing campaign. He began that yr 12-8-0 – on tempo for 40 wins throughout a full season.
However Bannister didn’t get an opportunity to see issues via in Springfield, as a substitute leaping to a Blues roster off to a horrible begin. Berube left St. Louis at 13-14-1 – once more good for sixth within the Central Division. Bannister was compelled to select up the items, and led St. Louis to an admirable 30-19-5 file – bringing out the very best of younger lineup items like Jake Neighbours and Scott Perunovich. However his robust run wasn’t sufficient to carry the Blues above a gradual begin, and so they’d miss the 2024 postseason by six factors.
St. Louis appears to be like to be on observe to overlook once more this yr. Whereas the Blues definitely have confronted unhealthy damage luck, the group has struggled to search out any scoring from down the lineup – with simply 4 gamers with 10-or-more factors via 22 video games this season. They haven’t been helped alongside by what was meant to be robust goaltending, with starter Jordan Binnington posting a .891 Sv% and three.04 GAA in 17 video games, and backup Joel Hofer recording a .893 and three.45 in six video games. That paints the image of top-to-bottom struggles in St. Louis, regardless of GM Doug Armstrong pushing for a heap of overturn and new faces this season.
That change will now proceed with a training change. Montgomery served two seasons as a Blues’ assistant coach in 2020-21 and 2021-22, getting employed off their bench into Boston’s head coach position. He proceeded to steer one of many biggest seasons of all time, setting the single-season wins file with a 65-12-5 standing. Montgomery introduced profession performances out of David Pastrnak, Linus Ullmark and Jeremy Swayman – although Boston couldn’t handle to push previous the primary spherical of the playoffs. Unbothered, Montgomery stayed red-hot via 2023-24, following his record-breaking marketing campaign with a powerful 47-20-15 file and second-round playoff exit. These two seasons – a mixed 112-32-20 file – made it all of the extra shocking when Boston selected to axe Montgomery after an 8-9-3 begin to the season.
Regardless of a nasty begin, Montgomery is clearly a profitable NHL coach – inspiring robust play since his first yr at an NHL helm, when he led the 2018-19 Dallas Stars to a 43-32-7 file. He continued with a 17-11-3 file in 2019-20 – however stepped down midseason for private causes. His first sighting after that was on the Blues’ bench that he’ll now head again to.
The connection between Montgomery and St. Louis runs deep. The Blues signed Montgomery as an undrafted free agent in 1993, instantly after he captained the College of Maine to their first NCAA championship at school historical past. It was a legendary season that noticed Montgomery and Paul Kariya – one other well-known Blue – lead maybe one of many biggest collegiate offenses of all time.
Montgomery saved the present going into the professionals, incomes a fast call-up after scoring 15 factors in his first 12 minor-league video games. He put up six objectives and 20 factors in 67 video games on the Blues’ roster – however couldn’t cling onto a lineup position on a roster that routinely turned over their depth traces. That kicked off Montgomery’s journeyman profession round North America. He’d go on to play 11 extra skilled seasons, however modified groups yearly – save for a three-year stint with the AHL’s Philadelphia Phantoms from 1997 to 2000, that kicked off with a Calder Cup championship.
