Flyers hire former Rangers coach Alain Vigneault
Alain Vigneault watches game action in the second period between the Rangers and the Chicago Blackhawks at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday, January 3, 2018. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
Alain Vigneault will return to the NHL for the 2019-20 season. The Flyers announced Monday that they have hired him as their 21st coach.
Vigneault coached the Rangers for five seasons and led them to the Stanley Cup Final in 2014. With the team entering a rebuilding phase, he was fired at the end of the 2017-18 season.
He takes over a Flyers team that went 37-37-8 and fired coach Dave Hakstol and general manager Ron Hextall during the season. According to Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic, Vigneault agreed to a five-year deal worth $25 million.
Vigneault, 57, has 648 wins in a 16-year NHL coaching career in which he led the Canucks for seven seasons before joining the Rangers in the summer of 2013.
He started in Montreal, spending four seasons as coach of the Canadiens. He was named Coach of the Year in 2006-07, his first season with the Canucks, and reached the Stanley Cup Final in 2011.
Vigneault will coach Team Canada in the upcoming World Championships.
Report: Russians on way
According to The Athletic, the Rangers have reached agreement on entry-level contracts with goaltender Igor Shestyorkin and forward Vitali Kravtsov, two young Russian stars whose KHL contracts will expire after this season.
The contracts are in effect until April 30, so the Rangers are not permitted to sign them, nor are they permitted to announce any agreements with them until May 1.
Shestyorkin, 23, went 24-3-1 with a 1.11 goals-against average and .953 save percentage, both best in the league, in 28 regular-season games for SKA St. Petersburg. His 10 shutouts tied for the league high, and his GAA and save percentage ranked second in league history.
Shestyorkin, a fourth-round draft pick in 2014, shared the net with former Ranger Magnus Hellberg for St. Petersburg, and they also split time in the playoffs.
Shestyorkin played the final game as St. Petersburg lost in seven to CSKA in the Western Conference finals. He appeared in 10 playoff games, compiling a 1.95 GAA and .904 save percentage.
Kravtsov, 19, was the ninth overall pick last summer. He had eight goals and 13 assists in 50 games for Traktor Chelyabinsk this season and led all players 20 or younger in goals, assists and points. He played for Russia in the World Junior Championships and had two goals and four assists in seven games.
Wolf Pack coach fired
The Rangers announced they have fired Hartford coach Keith McCambridge, who led the Wolf Pack the past two seasons. His assistant coach, Joe Mormina, also was let go.
Hartford finished last in the AHL’s Atlantic Division with a record of 29-36-7-4.
Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.
