So Long, Jack!
New York Islanders fire head coach Jack Capuano.
Hockey fans, I promise, not every article I write will be about the New York Islanders. In fact, with the way this season is going, the team won’t provide much to write about come April. With that being said, it gives me tears of joy to write this, as I’ve been itching to write about this topic for over three years and it felt like I’d never see the day. Today, the day the New York Islanders fired head coach Jack Capuano.
Now, before I get super excited about this move, let me first acknowledge a couple of things. First and foremost, in life, you never want to see someone lose a job. Like any human being would have to do, Jack Capuano will need to find a new job, most likely a college coaching job if I had to take a guess. So with regards to this, I wish Jack Capuano the best of luck in getting back on his feet. Secondly, Capuano was brought in from the AHL affiliate Bridgeport Sound Tigers during the 2010–2011 season, replacing fired head coach Scott Gordon, on an interim basis. However, the second half of that season provided isles fans with some hope, as the team actually was very competitive, in large part due to the surprise production from former Garth Snow waiver claim Michael Grabner, as well as a team motivated following a couple of “fun” games against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Following the season, Snow brought Capuano back, and he has been the head coach ever since. The point is, Cappy was in over his head from the beginning. I’m sure he worked hard as a coach and gave it everything he had. He’s tried to fix things at different points during his tenure, and to his credit, some have worked. But in the end, your AHL coach should not be the person to lead your franchise to the promise land, especially an in-house hire in an organization that has time and time again failed to have a functioning management group.
Finally, as I discussed in my last article, this Islanders team, as they are staffed now is… well… not very good. Put Mike Babcock behind the bench of this team, and you would likely still be looking at a borderline playoff team. Cappy was put on a suicide mission with this team, and he is not to blame for THIS season. With that being said, Capuano should’ve been fired 3 years ago, if you ask me. Better yet, if not for a team getting hot playing meaningless games back in the 2010–2011 season, he should’ve never been brought back in the first place. So I guess better late then never, eh?
Alright, enough gratitude and sympathy for the FORMER New York Islanders head coach! He’s finally gone! No more Capuano line blender, no more working “hahd and smaht” in reference to half of the forwards who the Isles need to produce by putting up points, no more post game interviews saying he likes the way the team played after a 5–1 loss; the list of “no more’s” goes on and on. More importantly, it shows that Islander’s brass is FINALLY seeing some issues with this team, both on the ice, behind the bench, and in the GM/Hockey Operations box. I truly believe that this was by far the toughest domino to fall in regards to getting some changes with this team, and now it’s up to Garth Snow to make sure he is not next.
Snow had a terrible offseason. It is looking more then likely that Snow also has had/will have quite a few busts with regards to drafting, especially when looking at where players were slotted in their respective drafts. Snow has made decisions that say “wow, good move,” but he’s had twice as many that went quite the opposite way, or simply didn’t improve the team enough for the value needed. He knows his job is in jeopardy, no matter how comfortable he looks with his big boy pants on in front of the media, and I am sure that deep down, he hopes that this move sparks the Isles to make a run at the playoffs to hopefully, for him at least, keep him employed for next season. However, I wouldn’t be so sure that a turnaround will happen, simply due to the afore mentioned factor that the team is simply not that good.
Replacing Jack Capuano on an interim basis (hopefully) is Doug Weight. As great of a player as he may have been, I don’t see him being any where near as effective of a coach. Lets look back.
Doug Weight was previously responsible for the isles “daunting” power play. The power play that currently sits dead last in the NHL. To be fair, it is not all on coaching, as personnel matters too, and a power play unit of John Tavares, Josh Bailey, Ryan Strome, Anders Lee, and Nick Leddy simply will not put up the numbers that a unit that includes the names of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Phil Kessel, Patric Hornqvist, and Kris Letang. However, failure to acknowledge and fix the problem of players not being suited for their roles is a whole other issue, and whether this is to blame on Capuano or Weight, this needs to be fixed moving forward. For example, how Anders Lee was not on the first power play unit, parked in front of the net causing havoc like he does best, earlier in the season is alarming. Almost as alarming as when Travis Hamonic is quarterbacking the second unit point spot instead of Johnny Boychuk and his booming slap shot or even Thomas Hickey and his offensive abilities. This issue was even more apparent on Weight’s power play units in past seasons when the personnel was much better, and the results still didn’t match up. THAT is on coaching, whether it’d be Weight, Capuano, or more than likely, both.
In the end, I don’t expect anything drastic to change with this team in the short run. Doug Weight in all likelihood will be a mirror image of what Jack Capuano was, since really all he knows from a coaching standpoint was learned under Cappy’s watch. In a perfect world, Weight will be relieved of his interim role following this disappointing season, barring a miraculous run to reach the playoffs. Furthermore, Garth Snow, barring any bold moves that somehow work out between now and the trade deadline, could also potentially be canned. But for now, Isles fans, enjoy. This very well may be the highlight of the season, but also, potentially, could be the start of repairing the current mess that is called the New York Islanders.
RIP to Jack Capuano as an NHL head coach. Embarrassingly enough, number two all time in wins as head coach of the New York Islanders.
