According to multiple reports, the meeting between Florida Panthers head coach Joel Quenneville and NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman has concluded The league office confirms the two sides met in the New York headquarters of the NHL and GM Bill Zito was on hand for the meeting. They also confirmed, there has been no resolution as of now.
This news will surprise some as many believe swift and decisive action is called for after it was revealed Quenneville lied about his knowledge of the sexual abuse that took place in 2010 between then video coach Brad Aldrich on Kyle Beach. Beach spoke yesterday in an emotional interview saying that he knew meetings that took place in Quenneville’s office regarding Beach’s coming forward about the abuse and Beach doesn’t believe the now-Panthers coach didn’t know. According to interviews with former Blackhawks GM Stan Bowman and former Blackhawks mental skills coach Jim Gary, a meeting took place on May 23 that Quenneville was said to be a part of. The abuse was discussed and reports suggest Quenneville was concerned with the idea of upsetting team chemistry during the playoff run.
As for what could come down here in the next few hours or days, the NHL can suspend Joel Quenneville, they can fine him or they can ban him from the league. They cannot fire him from the Panthers as that would need to be a decision made by the Panthers organization and the league doesn’t have that jurisdiction. It could be why Zito was a part of that meeting.
Further to this, Beach did say yesterday during his interview that he urges Bettman to take this matter seriously and heavily consider everything before rushing to a decision. That could be what Bettman is doing as the last thing anyone wants is a quick decision made that doesn’t offer justice to the serious nature of this matter. The NHL is already being criticized for the Blackhawks being fined a mere $2 million over what they called an “inadequate internal procedures and insufficient and untimely response.”
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