Bob Hartley won the Jack Adams Award last season as the NHL’s most outstanding head coach. On Tuesday, the Calgary Flames fired him.
He’s the sixth Jack Adams winner since 2005-06 to be fired from the team he won it with.
Hartley shouldn’t even have won the Jack Adams, though. The Flames were among the worst puck-possession teams (score-adjusted Corsi-for percentage of 45.8 over the last four years, 28th in the league) and earned a 2015 Stanley Cup playoff berth thanks to a very high PDO (save percentage plus shooting percentage) that was unsustainable.
Analytics people, including myself, predicted a sharp decline for the Flames in 2015-16, and they finished with 77 points (35-40-7), the fifth-worst record in the league. It was too easy to project.
The Flames should call Bruce Boudreau as soon as possible. Boudreau was fired last week after failing to get the Anaheim Ducks past Round 1. He’s the best head coach on the market and owns the highest regular-season points percentage in league history among coaches with at least 500 games of experience.
Boudreau’s Ducks teams consistently possessed the puck and defended very well. That’s the kind of style Calgary should adopt next season.
Thumbnail photo via Candice Ward/USA TODAY Sports Images
