Darryl Sutter is out in Calgary.
The Flames announced on Monday that they had relieved the veteran head coach of his duties, despite the fact that the two-year contract extension to which they signed him last fall isn’t set to kick in until July.
Now, with that hefty financial obligation still looming in the distance, the Flames need to hire both a new general manager and a new head coach as they attempt to rebound after an extremely disappointing 2022-23 season.
Here’s how Tyler Yaremchuk and Frank Seravalli reacted to the news of Sutter’s dismissal, which Seravalli helped break in the moments before the start of Monday’s episode of Daily Faceoff Live.
Tyler Yaremchuk: Frank Seravalli, our NHL insider here at Daily Faceoff, you were hard at work this morning breaking the news that Darryl Sutter is out as the head coach of the Calgary Flames. His extension hadn’t even kicked in yet, the two-year deal he signed with the club, and they’re making a change behind the bench. Frank, we are starting there. What led to this, and are you surprised that this happened even though they moved on from Brad Treliving as well?
Frank Seravalli: Well, it does seem a little ass-backwards in the sense that, the big reason that Brad Treliving is gone is because he wanted to make a coaching change and that didn’t happen, and therefore he decided to part ways and not sign a contract extension. That kind of leaves a lot of question marks. However, Don Maloney, their new president of hockey operations, was a big part of the exit interviews that took place with the Calgary Flames players. He saw and heard everything. And I’m not exaggerating when I say Darryl Sutter alienated 90 percent of this organization this season. It was not just players in the room but also members of the equipment and training staff, the assistant coaches, and other people in the front office. I wasn’t kidding when I framed the question this way when the regular season ended: “Does Darryl Sutter have a path to return as Calgary Flames head coach?” The answer that we learned on Monday is, “no.”
Despite their best attempts to try and keep him and not pay out that $4 million-a-year contract in vain, there was really no other way for the Calgary Flames to approach what is a gigantic offseason, both from a hiring GM perspective — does anyone really want to come in with a bulletproof coach under them? — and also trying to re-sign or keep critical pieces of this team’s core to be competitive. Elias Lindholm, Noah Hanifin, go down the list. A lot of players that need new contracts probably wouldn’t be signing, along with a long list of other players who had no interest in playing for Darryl Sutter again next season.
Watch the full episode here:
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