Marco Sturm named Bruins head coach

For Sturm, it’s a return to Boston. After all, the German, who was a first-round pick of the Sharks and played there for a while, was part of the famous Joe Thornton deal. He played in Boston from 2005 to 2010.

Sturm also played in Los Angeles, Washington, Vancouver and Florida during his (long) 938-game career in the Bettman circuit.

For the past three years, Sturm has been the coach of the Kings’ AHL feeder club. Prior to that, he spent several seasons as an assistant behind the Kings’ bench.

But in Boston, this will be his first NHL head job.

This means that hockey men looking for a position behind an NHL bench can no longer do so as chief pilot – unless there’s a big surprise.

There are still assistant positions, however. And Pascal Vincent comes to mind…

Note that Sturm is the third coach hired recently who will be taking his first steps as a pilot in the NHL. Dan Muse (Penguins) and Adam Foote (Canucks) are the others.

Lane Lambert (Kraken), Jeff Blashill (Blackhawks), Rick Tocchet (Flyers), Joel Quenneville (Ducks) and Mike Sullivan (Rangers) have filled the remaining vacancies.

This also means that all the teams that named an interim coach during the 2024-2025 season have recently changed pilots. We’re talking about the Bruins, Blackhawks and Flyers.

The Red Wings (Todd McLellan) and Blues (Jim Montgomery) also changed coaches during the 24-25 season, but in their case, it was never interim.

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