Isles' affable GM Mathieu Darche is highly competitive behind the smile
Islanders GM Mathieu Darche watches practice during prospect development camp at the Northwell Health Ice Center at Eisenhower Park on June 30. Credit: Getty Images/Bruce Bennett
TAMPA, Fla. — Mathieu Darche has an easygoing and outgoing personality, willing to chat and quick with a self-deprecating laugh and it’s all real. But don’t get fooled by it. The first-year Islanders general manager is as competitive as possible and, yes, returning to the arena where he spent three seasons as the Lightning’s assistant GM to Julien BriseBois after joining the organization in 2019 as director of hockey operations 100% meant something to him.
“I had six great years here,” Darche said, downplaying the focus on him. “It’s very different than if it were a coach or a player coming back. I’m not on the ice. I don’t have an impact on the actual game itself.”
Still, money on the board — the age-old hockey tradition of pledging financial reward for performance? “They’re better be,” one Islander said before Saturday night’s match against the Lightning at Benchmark International Arena.
“I think it means something for sure,” said his older brother, Jean-Philippe Darche, a former long-snapper in the Canadian Football League and for the Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks in 2006 who is still in the NFL as Kansas City’s team physician. He was in town as part of the Islanders’ fathers’/mentors’ trip.
“He’s got so much appreciation for the people here. They’re great people and they were great to him. He had a lot of a success here but I’m pretty sure he wants to bring the W.”
The Islanders won the team’s first meeting this season — one of three games in 12 days — with a 2-1 victory at UBS Arena on Tuesday. That snapped a three-game losing streak and helped keep the Islanders — perhaps surprisingly to some prognosticators — in the thick of the Eastern Conference playoff chase.
Darche’s energy, along with the injection of talent and enthusiasm brought by No. 1 overall pick Matthew Schaefer, has made the Islanders one of the better stories in the NHL. They are exciting to watch and capable of beating elite teams, as shown by the first win over the Atlantic Division-leading Lightning and Thursday’s 6-3 win over the NHL-best Avalanche.
Darche has fostered a truly collaborative effort with assistant GMs Ryan Bowness, Steve Pellegrini and Chris Lamoriello and particularly with special assistant Matt Martin, who seemingly never leaves Darche’s side.
“He’s extremely personable,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “He was always a joy to be around in that way. You could tell his relationship building skills were really good. The other thing, too, is he’s got a good eye for the game. I’d ask him about players, especially in the AHL where he was watching a lot of, and I thought he was bang-on in a lot of his insights. Plus, he was an eager learner.”
If anything, Darche’s somewhat zig-zag path to his first NHL GM job has left him more appreciative of his varied experiences.
He was a teammate with his brother for one season of Canadian college football at McGill, did not play the first of his 250 NHL career games with the Blue Jackets, Predators, Sharks, Lightning and hometown Canadiens until he was 25. He was on television doing some analysis and forged a career in the corporate world before joining the Lightning, where he was part of two Stanley Cup winners.
“Hockey was his dream all the time,” his brother said. “He was doing media work in Montreal, that kept him in hockey. The opportunity [with the Lightning] came out of nowhere. He had to make a decision, ‘Do I have a good gig here? I’m in my hometown, everything is going great. Do I uproot my family and come down to Tampa? He bet on himself and said let’s do it.'
“It’s been so much fun to watch him. He’s super happy. He’s working hard but he’s doing what he wants to be doing. It’s like a dream job.”
But don’t be fooled. Mathieu Darche desperately wanted to win Saturday night.
Andrew Gross joined Newsday in 2018 to cover the Islanders. He began reporting on the NHL in 2003 and has previously covered the Rangers and Devils. Other assignments have included the Jets, St. John’s and MLB.
