Who will be the next Seattle Kraken coach? Considering the candidates

The Seattle Kraken’s 2024-25 season ended in much the same way as their prior campaign: another year of watching the playoffs from afar, with their head coach again being shown the door—this time after just one season behind the bench. Now that the dust has settled on Dan Bylsma’s firing and Jason Botterill’s move into the general manager’s seat, speculation about who will succeed Bylsma will surely begin to heat up.

The Kraken are historically tight-lipped about who they are interviewing, but it never hurts to make some educated guesses about which coach could land behind the bench next season.

A chaotic offseason ahead on the coaching carousel

In the coming months, the coaching carousel is going to spin faster and more furiously than we’ve ever seen before. Including the New York Rangers—who already got their next guy in former Penguins coach Mike Sullivan—and the Anaheim Ducks—who opted to accept the PR fallout of putting Joel Quenneville back behind an NHL bench—eight out of 32 teams plan to enter next season with a new head coach at the helm. There’s still a chance more teams could part ways with their respective bench bosses as well.

What this means for the Kraken is that if they’re looking to lure one of the biggest available coaching names out there, they’ll face competition from around the NHL and may have to prove to their preferred candidate why Seattle is the right fit.

The good news on this front is that there’s a case to be made for Seattle as one of the more attractive destinations among the markets seeking new coaches. The organization has a strong prospect pool with young players knocking at the door, salary cap space and draft capital to improve this summer, and an ownership group committed to becoming a sustained winner in the near future.

That said, there are also draws in other cities, including the lore of more traditional markets like Boston, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh—not to mention the chance to coach a budding superstar like Connor Bedard in Chicago.

What the Kraken need in a coach

At the Kraken’s end-of-season presser, in which they officially introduced Jason Botterill as the next general manager of the team, I asked Botterill if he has any criteria in mind for his next coach. Here’s what he said:

“That’s something that we look forward to, just beginning our discussions and getting to know people a little bit better from that standpoint. I think one that’s— there’s going to be a lot of attributes that you certainly come into. I think finding someone who’s a leader down there in the locker room, has a strong voice and is certainly good at communication, but also good at utilizing the resources that this organization has. Whether you talk about R&D, the development staff, information from Coachella Valley, our strength and conditioning staff, there’s a lot of information.

“I think that a head coach [is like the] CEO down there and can certainly utilize that in building his lineup and building his roster, and we want to find someone who’s willing to utilize all that to put the best team forward on the ice for the Kraken.”

That says a lot without saying much, but it does give a glimpse into what may have been lacking in the relationship between Dan Bylsma and the front office and other departments—something Botterill hopes to correct with the team’s next hiring.

Botterill didn’t say this directly, but I have to think there’s also a desire to hire a coach who’s a relatively sure thing to get success out of this team. At this point, we know Bylsma wasn’t a unanimous pick to become the most recent coach, and it had been a long time since he had been a head coach at the NHL level. So something tells me that whoever Seattle lands on this time around will be somebody who has been behind an NHL bench recently and has had success in the league.

The candidates

Friend of the Sound Of Hockey Podcast and senior writer for ESPN.com, Greg Wyshynski, put together a comprehensive list of all the coaching candidates out there. It’s behind the ESPN paywall, but it’s worth a read if you have access. Wyshynski placed the candidates into categories like “The Big Bosses,” which includes Jay Woodcroft and Rick Tocchet; “The Fresh Firings,” including Drew Bannister, Derek Lalonde, Peter Laviolette, John Tortorella, et al.; and “The Well Traveled,” with guys like Bruce Boudreau, Gerard Gallant, and Mike Yeo, among others.

Since Wyshynski wrote that on April 25, there has already been some clarity in the coaching market, with Sullivan heading to the Rangers and Quenneville to the Ducks and David Carle committing long-term to stay at the University of Denver.

I’ve also often wondered if any coaches who reached the playoffs but bowed out quickly could become available—like Jared Bednar or Jon Cooper (Cooper would probably have to leave of his own volition)—but both of their general managers stated definitively that they’ll be back with Colorado and Tampa Bay, respectively, next season. Similarly, I’ve always thought Rod Brind’Amour would fit in Seattle if he were ever to hit the market, but with the Hurricanes getting deeper into the playoffs and his son playing in the organization, Rod the Bod feels highly unlikely to make his way to the Northwest.

Thinking about the list of candidates that Wyshynski put together, I’m whittling my list down to a few specific individuals that I think could end up being in the conversation to become the next coach of the Kraken. This is not based on insider knowledge, and I won’t pick a favorite or anything like that; I’m just connecting dots to figure out who could be a fit.

Rick Tocchet

Lots of folks have assumed Rick Tocchet—who recently excused himself from the dumpster fire up the road in Vancouver—will want to go to one of his former teams from his playing days, like the Philadelphia Flyers or Pittsburgh Penguins.

I’m not totally convinced, though. Those clubs finished last and second-to-last in the Metropolitan Division this season, and while the Flyers have some exciting young talent, they appear far from being competitive again. Meanwhile, the Penguins are heading into several seasons of misery as they phase out their aging core of veterans.

I know the Kraken have missed the playoffs in three of their first four years and were near the bottom of the Pacific Division this year, but I still believe they’re heading toward consistent playoff contention. The potential for an immediate payoff from joining the Kraken feels higher than for other teams seeking coaches.

Tocchet, 61, makes sense for Seattle because he clearly believes in open communication with the players and brings a harder-nosed approach that could push both veterans and rookies. It speaks volumes that although the Canucks are coming off a disappointing year that featured several soap operas, the Vancouver front office very much wanted him back.

There’s also a history between Tocchet and Seattle, and we do believe the front office is interested in hiring him. Remember, Tocchet was expected to be named the team’s first head coach back in 2021, but in the 11th hour, for some unknown reason, the Kraken changed course and went with Dave Hakstol.

Tocchet has a career coaching record of 286-265-87. In two and a half seasons with the Canucks, he went 108-65-27 and won the Pacific Division in 2023-24. That season, Vancouver defeated the Nashville Predators in the first round of the playoffs before being ousted by the Edmonton Oilers in seven games.

Jay Woodcroft

Another available coach who appears to be a hot commodity this offseason is Jay Woodcroft, who has a shorter track record than Tocchet but a good one nonetheless.

Woodcroft, 48, has an interesting story. He started his coaching career as Detroit’s video coach back in 2005. He then became an assistant under Todd McLellan in San Jose and followed him to Edmonton two months after both were let go by the Sharks in 2015. His first pro head-coaching gig came with the Oilers’ AHL affiliate, the Bakersfield Condors, in 2018. After a successful stint as interim head coach of the Oilers—he guided them to the Western Conference Finals—he was made the full-time head coach the following season.

The Oilers thrived under Woodcroft in his one full season behind the bench, racking up 109 points in the standings before losing to the eventual Stanley Cup winners, the Vegas Golden Knights, in the second round of the playoffs.

Things got off to a very rocky start in Edmonton in 2023-24, though, and after a 3-9-1 record dropped the Oilers to the bottom of the Pacific Division standings, Woodcroft was shown the door. Interestingly, the last game he coached that season was against the Kraken at Climate Pledge Arena, a game Edmonton won 4-1. Regardless, Woodcroft was fired the next day.

I remember being in his last press conference at CPA, and he seemed to know the firing was coming. He had clearly had enough with Sportsnet columnist Mark Spector and answered all of his questions with one word: “No.”

Woodcroft does appear to be a good fit with Seattle as well, in that he strikes me as a forward-thinking coach. I am curious, though, how he can fare without the luxury of having superstars like Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl.

Peter Laviolette

Beyond those two fairly obvious names, I have a hard time finding a perfect fit among other available candidates. There’s a big group of coaches who have been fired recently, including veterans like John Tortorella and Peter Laviolette. I could eat my words, but I don’t think I see the Kraken hiring Torts.

I don’t really see them hiring Laviolette either, but they certainly would know what they’re getting in a guy like him. Laviolette has coached nearly 1,600 regular-season games in the NHL and 170 playoff games. He had long stints in Nashville, Carolina, and Philadelphia, then a three-year stay in Washington and two years with each of the New York teams, most recently getting fired by the Rangers after a 39-36-7 season. He won the Stanley Cup with the Hurricanes in 2006 and coached the Flyers and Predators to the Stanley Cup Final in 2010 and 2017, respectively.

Jay Leach

I’m including Jay Leach here because he was a candidate last year and is well regarded by the Kraken organization for the work he did with the blue line as an assistant under former head coach Dave Hakstol.

When Leach did not get the head coaching job last summer, he returned to the Boston Bruins organization, where he had previously been the head coach of their AHL affiliate in Providence.

I think Leach will be a good head coach, but I also still think Seattle is looking for somebody with a proven NHL track record right now. This is why I don’t foresee them hiring Leach or other up-and-comers like Mitch Love (currently an assistant coach for Washington) or Pat Ferschweiler (just won the NCAA championship with Western Michigan).

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What do you think, folks? Who will the Kraken hire, and who else do you think they’re considering as candidates to be their next head coach?